Elsa Antonia
by daftheed
Summary: Elsa has been letting the night catch up to her again and her mind is buzzing with activity. But even now, she cant sleep. Her restlessness is getting to her and people befuddle her. She seeks to understand others, but what do the others want?
1. Chapter 1

**Elsa Antonia**

She sat, alert, trying to ignore the sounds. Elsa Antonia had been awake the whole night. She was not happy, nor sad. She was deep into work. Work that required her best attention.

Elsa had always found her attention peaking in the nightime. She wasn't sure if it was her medication, or hyperactive nature, or just her. But she knew whatever it is was helping for the moment.

The sounds were of the birds. God how she hated them. She could hear every slithering note, every secondary sound, the branches rustling as they stood on and off them. It was a nightmare and the 'great noise' was coming to get her. But she knew better.

Looking again at her chessboard, positioned in front of her on the bed she plotted her next move. She was nude except for some sparse nightclothes. Clothes were, at best, tolerable and at worst impossible. They clung, they dragged along skin, they made her sweat and their material and her did not mesh. It was a pale discomfort. It was like being touched, but all the time. It made her itch and cover her arms more, to keep them from feeling the air.

Air or Cloth, it did not matter, she hated the feeling.

She was nearing the endgame now. Her imaginary opponent was running out of ideas, but so was she.

_Its going to be a stalemate, I think._

She looked with dread to the sky outside the window. The country was gorgeous and she had to work not to get lost in the wind and the waves of wheat. Then, bored with this, she imagined a giant chessboard. Which piece would she be?

Princess? That isn't a piece. Queen it was then, but she didn't feel up to it. She ran her hand perpendicularly across her stomach. She was getting mentally stimulated. The thought of a giant chessboard! She was already feeling giddy. Her arms forced themselves down by her sides and her eyes focused, if that was the right word, on the tree at the other end of the field.

_I could sit on that tree and watch the game. Me and Dad! We can play and the field could have a board carved into it!_

Then she imaged some of her favourite checkmates. It was becoming intense to think about and she felt the weight in her arms, which only drove her on. The best ones involved the enemy pieces, where the king is stopped by his own men. She was drinking these thoughts in, the field as a backdrop. She was getting hyper off the feeling of scale and depth as the pieces stood watching.

But as the bird once again snapped her from her loss of the world, she felt tired all too completely. She really really did not want to sleep. But stalemates were boring and the sky was forming a warm colour.

She was always afraid of it. The sun coming up. She relished winters days, where the nights were long and the days short. Days meant riding her bike across the dirt road where every bump was memorised. She wanted to power forward but had to wait for her Mother, her Mothers friend and the other two children she lived across from. Even here, in the countryside, she had to socialise, it seemed. But in truth she liked them. They were a brother and sister pair of differing interests. But they liked to tussle, playfully and so did Elsa. Elsa could only tolerate touch as long as she knew she could force it off of her. When she was even younger, she had been a violent child, lashing out at everything she couldn't comprehend.

She thought of all this that was ahead of her, knocking several chess pieces over. Coming to, she yawned and accepted her defeat. Every night she sat up willing the sun to never come and every night it eventually showed. She didn't want to be awake when that happened. This was too nice. Her muscles were relaxed, her back was sore but that was her fault, from hunching. She loved being alone. Not having to worry about picking her nose or looking interested in other peoples things all the time. Her face could relax, her mind could ease and she could experience the world through her own compensating filters when she was faced with something foreboding.

She climbed down the short ladder of her raised bed and with chess pieces and board, set about placing them all very carefully into their place. The brown desk had her globe and various bits of things from past adventures. She found her memory lacking whenever she did anything outdoors, so she took to collecting interesting objects if she could; anything from stealing pens to chalk, coloured rocks on beaches or a walking stick to balloons (Though she hated helium balloons) toy guns and anything purple. These brought her back to a particular point in the past, and she could relive it again for a moment. She always liked doing that. The past was not yet dark.

She spent several minutes putting the pieces in the right places. Her eyes were by now long suited to the dark. Finally satisfied, she lay again on her bed, and heard again the bird, the wind passing her window, the click of the clock in the hallway outside her room.

She damned her ears. Damned them. They were so sensitive. It had its uses. She was never lost to conversations in a distance and she could always tell what it was her parents were talking about. She knew if her mother was in good spirits or bad and could decipher by tone alone if her Mother was stressed. Yet if one approached Elsa and spoke to her, she would be very careful at listening. Words were her one ally. She wasn't sure but people had all sorts of rules about speaking that troubled her and though she wasn't sure why, she missed alot from whatever was said to her.

"You cant just say no to someone, dear. You have to be nice"

Nice. That word. It meant so many things that it hurt Elsa's head to use it. All she could think about was how many ways it could be used. Some people _looked_ nice, some people _were _nice, some people _are_ nice, some things _feel_ nice and some actions are_ nice. _

Elsa was getting bored of herself now and the clock was ticking mercilessly forward. Why was she wasting her time confusing herself more about the rules of other people? Her otherness was not always so pleasant when other people were about and it was stifling to have it on her mind when she was alone.

She could hear the clock. She tried to make it go away or at least seem softer and she almost succeeded. But when she tried to sleep, there it was again. It seemed the sound was the same each time, but to Elsa there may as well have been a machine gun chewing up and spitting out bullets like someone chomping on pistachio nuts.

It _would not stop._

It was all she could think about. So, she decided after a moments thought, to carry herself out of bed, once again exhausted. She opened her cupboard over the course of two minutes, for fear of waking up anyone else. Her general light-weighted-ness and taut feet were a help. It was night time so dark colours were needed. She knew if she was caught she would have to blend in with the dirt road amongst the stones and glass-like muck that beheld rocks. But she had nothing in brown. Black it was then.

The jacket was waterproof, which was good. She wouldn't have worn it otherwise. Such coats had nothing to grab or fiddle with. She liked to have something to play with and preferably chew.

"Dont chew your zipper. See, this is why you run out of clothes so much, Elsa."

Trackies on and not bothering with underwear, as the night looked warm, she crept slowly out of her room, speeding up the opening of the door just before every creak. Upon opening her door, the clock got louder but more defined. She could hear the low buzz of the fridge being a fridge in the room 10 feet down the hall on her left and the compact little sounds of dripping from the bathroom to her right. She took a minute to handle it. Her brain always took everything in, necessary or not. She concentrated on the red door that lead to the outside. She was fortunate; the back garden steps were on the other side and her room sat opposite it. And every other member of the household was sleeping on the other side of the building. It was great having a building with no stairs.

Now accustomed to these new sounds and the different smells, Elsa took one step, picking it out amongst the floor for silence.

_Regulate breathe. Dont breath too much, or it might be loud._

Elsa Antonia was going for a 4 am walk.


	2. Chapter 2

**My step brother visited and i could get nothing done while he was here. He is gone now, so here is the chapter. After this, i hope things can become more interesting. **

The door opened with painful slowness. Elsa could smell it. The metal and paint that was peeling, the strange feeling of its wooden treatment. Somewhat appealing.

Then the rush of air, It was calm, like a petal on water. But she focused on it, pausing to absorb it. Enjoying it, she opened it more and peered on to the other side.

She lifted herself up, with lingering pain from her exhaustion. The garden was beautiful. The trampoline lay, covered in water from the last days rain. The stone steps, like a throne almost, led down to the grass. There was a greenhouse at the far end and then the fence, then the road, then her neighbours garden. There was a hedge to her left.

She thought about all these things, trying to remind herself of what she was doing. She shivered at the chill of the calm wind. She was already cold, but as she eased the door closed behind her, the sound of the air attracted her. It was like a very calm whisper. The wheat field to the right added to the acoustic pleasure. She outstretched her arms and felt the wind.

Which way is it going? She stood, ignorant of everything and for all considerations, happy. The jacket was getting still though and her skin hated it. Soon the gentle wind was forcing her to move to. Movement made the sensation of touch spread over her from the clothes and thus, bother her less. Better to have pain all over her that is easy to ignore, that irritations which persists and get worse with time.

She reached the grass and strolled more. She soon found her way over the fence, doing a single leap over it, as the metal bars would make too much noise for footwork.

_Ah. That rush of air. Theres a car on the road, down the dirt path, but its so far away. It doesn't know im here. Nothing does. No eyes or ears to see or hear. No rules or faces reading._

It only made her feel more isolated. Elsa found this to be well enough at first. It was so beautifully surreal, the silence. Every movement she made was reverberated throughout her surroundings. Turning left on the road, past the hedge, she could see, half a mile ahead of her, a dirt road with a stream adjacent to it. There was another dirt road above it, an old railway, now seiged by trees. It was historic.

It was old, yet it was beautiful to her. Even as she felt the weight of her clothes, the chill through her legs, the vague dampness in her shoes, she could not help feeling so at peace. It was not simply to be alone. It was to be alone and yet be surrounded by space. Only a view of the stars would make it more beautiful. She walked, carefully at first, down the dirt path. Then, as the houses receded, she soon found her steps firm and she felt compelled to sing.

And so she did sing. So lost in it that she would often find herself stopping, just to hear the world around her. Hearing the birds. Hearing the trees, the wind.

She was never more content than now. Lost to sound. Lost to place. Lost to setting. This was what liberation felt like.

The sun had now cast its hand above the dead railway and it was getting lower. She hoped it would leave the fields, for now.

_If time is limited, why is it THIS limited._

The sun used to terrify Elsa. When she was 7, she became obsessed with space and the solar system. She knew all the planets, all the moons, she knew how far they were and what they were made of. She still did. But then she got to the sun. And she got scared. One day, many years in the future, the sun would expand, it would swallow the earth, taking with it absolutely everything. Her being dead in many years time offered little comfort and from then on, she never trusted the sun.

She adored how it gave her life, her skin, her energy...but one day, like us, it was going to die. To Elsa, she imagined it would be like a mother dying.

She looked at the cracked dirt road once more, still singing. Then she found she could not sing. She had stopped. Not by choice. She had went down another of her thought tunnels.

_Elsa! Stop daydreaming and get to work._

Her teachers never rested. And neither did her Mother. She was beginning to think of school, of herself and how no one seemed to keep her in their thoughts except as some irritant worthy of displacement.

She paced back towards the house unevenly, almost hoping to fall and embrace the ground and sleep...god she wished to sleep soundly. She did lie in the grass by the side of the quiet road, and for the nicest of moments, the wind passed over her face without hurting her eyes. She could stay like this for the rest of her life. Let the stars pass over, over and over. Let the grass grow over her. She began to enter a state not unlike sleep. The wind rubbed her body, letting her rest. She finally felt calm. Truly calm. The type of calm she never seemed to have.

She saw a purple shroud, it was foamy, not unlike the sea. Then it flowed and flowed in front of her. The wind got louder and it got stronger, the shroud kept growing. She wasn't aware of how lost one could be in their own mind. It made Elsa wonder if she was alone to be like this and have no one to share it with.

To be so obsessive, so curious and so strange, at least to everyone else.

She was now 12. She knew she was not quite like the other children. She much preferred adults. Adults listened to her and responded, or at least, anyone who was not her Mother did. But they were not friends. She was looking at her colleagues and it was more than just a wish for a friend. She was beginning to find things in them she did not before. Even some things that she found interesting. It made her world tingled with worry.

_Am i really alone? And if so, why does this not bother me? Oh but it does. Maybe im different but im not stupid. I don't wish to be alone. Not forever. Love and touch has no interest to me, but friendship...oh, i wonder what a friend is like. Im so pathetic. I don't even know._

She didn't know what she was. She knew she was weird. Mum called her special. Dad she wasn't ever sure. But she had no words for herself, and no amount of chess or history was going to help her.

_Do friends care for you?_

All she could think of was how cruelly she had been treated in her life. She was never quite comfortable around people. Bullied for throwing her cap at the fence posts, to catch it, because she liked the challenge and she saw it in a film. Laughed at for saying things that made sense. Chosen last all the time. Always nitpicked, always prodded at with words and sayings she couldn't grasp.

_Why do they set out to get me? What have i done wrong? How can i be more like them? To appease them?_

This made her think too much and she was snapped from the abyss. The sun had conquered the far ahead fields and was getting ever closer to her white walled, hedge sided home. She walked calmly back to the house, retreated over the fence and took off her hateful jacket, leaving it outside in the garden. Its feeling was getting too much for her. She felt an urge to itch all over herself and she was agitated to no end. She hated feeling unhappy and worried over things that seemed to little in the universe at large.

She powered through the hall to her room and ended up near panicked. In the end she did not sleep. Mother woke her at 8 and the day began once more. She cared for nothing except more sleep. The other children were there at school. She wished she could fall asleep anywhere and never wake. Never again have to worry about it all.

How she hated everyone. Mum. The teachers and especially the other children. She hated them. She fantasised about hurting them, but she never acted upon it. In the end it just left her feeling guilt. Guilt at being so different and yet powerless to become more like the others. She was alone.

As far as Elsa Antonia was concerned, she would be alone forever.

But she wished it was not so.


	3. Chapter 3

The other children used to be far worse. She was running around, playing tig. Her weak muscles prevented her running much, But she was insatiably competitive about it. She could run and it turned everything else off. But she was tired and her heart was trying to leave her chest. So she stopped.

"What you doing Elsa?"

She hated Daryl too. That little creature had an annoying habit of getting on Elsa's nerves.

"Im tired. Someone else is 'it'."

She started walking away, towards the low wall next to the tarmac court, before she could hear anything she didn't like. But as usual, she heard them anyway.

"...quitter...she always does this..."

She sat on the wall. It was cold and stony. She didn't like it much. She wasn't liking much of anything today. They had Geography earlier. Nothing was more boring and Elsa sat motionless, filling slowly with dread as the time to hand her jotter in approached. She avoided Mrs Esthers gaze as she handed it in. Just as she did a year ago. And the year preceding. It became a machine-like process that any interested observer could predict like an astronomer would an eclipse.

The sky was a horrid grey that seemed too heavy to hold itself up. It made her think of how weak gravity truly was. An entire planet was trying to pull her to its centre in that very moment. It was going to do it for every day of her life. Crying, sleeping, wakeful or heart-broken, this earth could still not make her fall. It comforted her in between her dips into the sleepful pool of her mind.

_Alone or not, perhaps i am stronger than i am._

Later that day

535 + 247 =

Elsa worked quickly and spliced the numbers in her mind. She took no pleasure from the numbers themselves. But she did find the sense of completion maths offered immensely satisfying. The sense of near perfection. A lack of doubt. The belief that something ungodly could still be ordered well. That something human could be intricate and beautiful in a way that only gods would know.

_Add the hundreds, then the tens then the digits._

To Elsa it was as logical as timekeeping or the passage of time itself. She loved it. Plus it made her seem smart. Her ego was not large but it had a lot of blank space.

_782_

Mrs Esther commended her work openly to the class; "Yes Elsa. And quick too. Well done"

Elsa gave her teacher a puzzled look. How long did she take? She could not say. Her sense of time was incredibly varied when it came to school. All the fun things seemed to pass really quickly. While geography took centuries, maths went by in little increments, punctuated with each answer. Structure, silence, security. Elsa imagined a series of screws and bolts running in a asymmetrical circle. It was how she saw her brains functions and she imagined everyone carried little motors in their heads, specifically to understand time.

_People are machines. Complex and with a need for power (food). _

Elsa often thought of other people this way. It made them seem more fair and less subjected to the whims of others. But her better mind taught her this wasn't true.

The class had dropped its formality as Miss Esther left the room for something. Elsa wondered for long periods what she could be up to. Then Daryl and other degenerates made themselves known.

"Elsa, what did you get?"

_Now why would he ask?_

"29 out of 30. Again. Same as the last four times. It was irritating because the 1st one i got my 24 and 144 mixed up again. Im always..."

"You never shut up do you?"

"Sorry I..."

He looked away and lost interest but was sure to laugh. He made a point of showing it too She felt weaker because she knew she wasn't much of a physical specimen. She often fantasised about killing them. She saw it in films. The main character would have a tantrum and throw various objects about, lamenting how horrible it all was.

She didn't want to be like that. But she got angry so easily. It drove her mad in the head. Showing off or making jokes never seemed to make it easier. She was, in a way she was unsure of, always nearly angry.

_Eccentric Elsa._

She was a fragile child. But her mind was better than her body. It hurt Elsa but above all it confused her. He asked and she gave an answer. She was targeted so much but could not strike one of them in the jaw and be done with it. Partly because her mother taught her manners and manners were important because not enough people had them. But also partly out of fear. Fear of retaliation.

_Girls were smarter than boys but boys were more likely to hit you._

Elsa had learned this the difficult way. She wondered if it could be otherwise, but it wasn't very interesting to her

_Its always me. Its this thing. Uh! What to name it, this weirdness. They take it and pull it to pieces like pulling apart knots to a pier._

She hated them for that. How they could throw her off her setting so easily. Daryl wasn't alone. There was Marcus, who was ginger. He had pretended to be Elsa's friend but then made fun of her again. He was a bringer of false hope, with a tongue fit for a very dangerous sailor.

There was Nathaniel. He was a very shrewd little boy and one of the few Elsa was taller than. Something she sometimes used to her advantage. He was good with words and gave off the unforgettable scent of aloofness. But Elsa feared he was in fact far more collected and manipulative than that. But she had no word for these things.

They were feelings about others that she could 'feel'. She had them well thought out and didn't trust anyone because of them. But she couldn't write them down or speak them out.

Elsa had long accepted that to live with the people she was shuffled along with in this godforsaken place she could trust no one. Laughter and jokes were her enemies and her hyper activeness was not a help. Mum called it ADHD.

Those little white pills she took for it. She never even thought of how they affected her. She knew that it was so she would behave and she did, but it sent her brain into a spin. She would get lost about the facts she had learned that day from her encyclopaedia. She couldn't talk well anyway. But the pills killed her interest in talking. She felt laboured doing it and thus she talked less. Talking less meant more seclusion, more time alone and thus more time to think. Elsa usually preferred that.

But she found something that was becoming more unpleasant with time; more thinking did not always lead to more enjoyment in life and the day, on or off the pills. Sometimes it left her feeling empty and without a word to speak. She talked to herself sometimes. Always words, never scenarios.

As far as she knew, she couldn't tell stories, but she was getting into them more. Fiction could capture her and keep her still, which she liked. It passed the time. And sometimes, she could even enjoy it and relate to characters. But none were like her. The characters were always boring and would only have one characteristic she liked. But the worlds were fascinating. The places, the descriptions, they were far more interesting than any person.

Elsa connected to that idea very strongly and she thought it must be her unique perspective that made her think like that.

As they sat for free time she still found herself opening her Chess book. She had each page memorised yet she would not read anything else just now. She was too content with this book. It was her fathers and she had been gifted the book to "Improve her skills and learn to beat me".

Father was always competitive about chess. And she had inherited it in extremis.

Free time was passing quietly. Even the miscreants like Daryl found something worth reading and contented themselves with the quiet. She had to wonder what they got out of it.

And then new boy arrived. Quietly.

Elsa had been ill and missed many a day in school. On her return she found no friends missing her or questions. Nothing but a lot of work that she hated just from looking at it.

She hardly noticed him. He seemed oddly quiet himself and though she occasionally caught him amongst her three most wanted, he never seemed 'of' them. In him she found something incurably likeable and even slightly trustworthy.

_In that case, i can never trust him. It is always those people who make fun of me the most._

But she checked. With every chance he had, he did not indulge in it. Every chance to pile on the insults, every opportunity to point out a shortcoming, like the dandruff in her hair, he didn't take advantage of it.

He was short, about Elsa's height with brown hair that curled if it got too long. She could guess by how much he fiddled through his hair that it annoyed him. Their school uniforms were universally hated, but not by him. He seemed comfy in them. He seemed to have some kind of eye twitch that was out of his control.

She only noticed this because he, like her, sat out of P.E.

He always played with his hands. He was forever moving them and twirling his hair absent-mindedly with his fingers. She never looked into people's eyes but she could tell he was always looking slightly downward intensely, as if staring into a graph. He also moved his feet. He would put the front of his foot diagonal then pull the heel along with it, doing it in a row.

She wasn't allowed a book when sitting out of P.E. So she was forced to notice him. He never even looked at her or said anything but he didn't look stressed. She was half asleep anyway and most of the time wouldn't have paid attention to him except out of a desperate need to be awake.

One day, the May was especially warm and their teacher informed them they were to work outside. Elsa liked the idea and as the new boy turned to look away from the others, she could see him beaming. He liked it too, she thought.

They both sat on the grass. The trees near the raised and fenced road made the sound Elsa liked. So loud for something so stationary and helpless. It was like a whistle and it made Elsa think of the letter 'L'.

She looked to the new boy and noticed he was more animated. He too was looking at the trees and staring around the green. He enjoyed this and was clearly enthralled by what surrounded him.

Elsa was unconsciously pulling her hands into the grass and ripping it out in bunches as she looked at him, travelling down in her thought train. She remembered what her mother told her, and stopped the action, but she felt a strange opaqueness take over her when she stopped. She hated the feeling. It seemed unnatural and artificial not to pull on the grass.

But it forced her to notice the boy again and she was taken aback quite a ways when he suddenly looked directly at her. His eyes were intense and Elsa felt like she was being aimed at. She was now intensely uncomfortable but it gave its way to curiosity as well.

The trees continued to whistle, the children in the distance kept playing football and now the boy who always looked at the ground and suddenly found a reason to look at her.

Without a smile or a frown, with tenseness in the cheeks, he spoke his first direct words to her:

"Hi. Im John."

**Authors commentary:**

**Yes, ive decided to make an OC. I am not going to say anything about romance or what John will become in my commentary. This is for the simple reason that i dislike authors telling us in advance if there is something like a ship pairing, or a character death, or a happy or sad ending. To me, the story should speak for itself and be good enough to leave the reader both uncertain and enthralled.**

**Its up to you whether i have achieved this or not.**

**Authors Notes:**

**I am British so i am using the British school system here. This means they are in primary school, which you go to from ages 5-12 or 4-11. Football is 'soccer' and so on. If there is any confusion let me know in a review, i'd be happy to clear things up.**

**I will update when i can.**


	4. Chapter 4

"Hello. I am Elsa Antonia. If I may ask, what is it?"

John looked away and seemed to think. Elsa wasn't sure what to say, but she was curious about him.

"Well, Elsa Antonia, I just thought I should say hello. We have been standing next to each other for weeks."

Elsa was defensive somewhat.

"Does time equal conversation to you?"

"Conversation is not always needed. Don't worry. I know what it's like to not talk much, or to not want to talk. Words are so easily taken the wrong way by other people. I only want to introduce myself and let you know I am not your enemy."

Elsa could not see it but John was tensing slightly. He was worried she would be scared of him, or simply uninterested. He was happy to find she was indeed thinking her reply over. Taking her time. But he was trying to ignore the shouts and noises of the others a bit away from them.

"So you understand that I don't cooperate with others very well?"

"Yes"

Elsa was at a loss. She was not any sort of emotion but she was very confused. She was getting scared she would make herself look stupid. Words spoken were not the ones she preferred. But she did want to be clear and forward, as John seemed to be trying to do.

"I am considered strange by other people. I suppose I am different in a way. I don't know why. Nor why you are talking to me."

She frowned slightly but kept her face as evenly attentive as she could to him as well as to the sounds around. The occasional really loud shouts when a goal was scored by her classmates frightened her a little. But it annoyed her more.

"Everyone is different." said John, as if stating the obvious.

But she had caught an error she couldn't ignore.

"Well actually no, identical twins are at least geneti- gen-tic-alley (she caught her breath stumbling over the word) the same, but not on their finger prints. There was actually one time where a twin had killed someone but they couldn't jail him because his identical brother was in the area at the time and they couldn't prove which was which"

She could feel herself come down. She looked at John again, having been inside her brain for a time. He was focusing on the people in the distance.

"You aren't listening" she almost whispered. Over the wind and tree speech it might have been lost to him but John swiftly replied.

"No, I am listening. It's quite interesting."

He did not look at her.

She thought about her monologuing and felt terrible, like she usually did after she spoke like that, with a strange compulsion that other people never seemed to have.

"Sorry. I bore people a lot by talking. I'm not good at knowing when to stop."

This time he turned his head in her direction but still did not look. She herself wasn't looking at him either. Each was doing as they always did individually, not connecting eyes unless they absolutely had to.

"Elsa Antonia, what you said was interesting. I was not bored by it."

She did not believe him and became disheartened. But this was not Johns fault. She never believed anyone when they said that to her. It was an awful thing to never quite believe when people told you good things like that. Elsa was stuck between half hoping people genuinely did find her interesting and just believing that everyone was humouring her.

Her thoughts were getting emotional but in a low level, longing sort of way.

John spoke again, surprising her.

"This football game is infinitely more boring than a twin killing people."

Elsa did not feel like laughing, but chuckled a little, to be polite. John seemed to intuit this, finally adding; "I know. That wasn't very funny."

He was right, but she said nothing. So far she did not know what to make of him. They had shared few words and she had made the classic mistake of over-talking to someone new. As far as she was concerned, he was lost to her as any kind of friend.

So she was surprised when John perked up and suddenly spoke once again, this time for longer.

"Did you know football was not even a sport in any reality until about 100 years ago? It is perhaps the most global sport around and yet it is very new. But this is because of how easy it is to play. The equipment is simple and so are the rules. Plus it encourages competition. Competitive people are sometimes not just the most driven, but also the most pressured. It must be nice, to not have a need to be better than others at something."

He stopped himself with a visible restraint.

"My turn to apologise; I do that too"

He grinned slightly, but Elsa could not say exactly why. She was unable to avoid grinning back.

Elsa was pleased in one respect. John was mysterious, yet he seemed quite aloof and open to her. She liked it. But she still did not trust him much, and was even more on edge when he wasn't talking.

"Don't apologise. I'm glad. I thought I was the only one who did that." Her sentence must have sounded far friendlier to him than she intended.

But like always, he did not seem to take advantage of it.

"Well you'd be surprised. There's over 6 billion of us running around now."

"Running around...where?" Elsa had just completely lost her way. He may as well have spoken to her in German.

"Oh, I am sorry. No, I mean on the planet. Obviously there are people who don't run and people who can't. It's a phrase. I'm not a fan of them but they are very easy to pick up and use. Others use them, so I do too."

Elsa was relaxed a little more. She was always taking meaning to the wrong things and confusing words for meaning something else. But she hadn't met anyone her age who seemed to understand that. Everyone just assumed that everyone else was in on it, while Elsa was left lost to it.

She said nothing because she wasn't sure how to respond and had forgotten what he said before. But she was starting listen to John. Listen to him properly. And only people she found interesting could do that. Even if he was into football.

"These people always like to rely on old phrases. 'Eyes peeled', 'at the end of the day' keep your socks on'. We have this tool, language, and we don't use it fully."

Elsa was interested. She hadn't heard someone talk about words like this. Not from someone her age.

"It sounds like you love words"

John paused and stared intently at the ground. Just like that, something changed in him.

"Words are my friends, Elsa Antonia"

"Well you speak like someone much older."

"Well I've lived twelve years thus far and it seemed like a long time to me, and that's just the bits I remember."

That last comment had Elsa thinking, quietly but happily. It was quite true.

Then they saw that fateful sight; the gym teacher, calling them in. Elsa sighed. She was actually starting to get lost in a conversation, even if it was strange and unprompted.

John stood up and quite briskly walked away. He did not say anything. She watched him walk. He picked up the pace when the football field cleared of children. He didn't want to be close to them.

She found herself staring into him, and then she snapped away from it. The sounds came back, the noise was deafening. She was lost and then she noticed her feet were wet. It had started raining.

_I got lost again. Daydreams_

She clenched her hands hard as she made her sloppy, slushy footed way back to the school. She felt like she had just embarrassed herself.

John stood at the door, leaning against the wall. He smiled at Elsa. She thought for a split second what she should do. Then, it occurred to her to smile back. Faces were confusing, but a smile was a smile. And he had not made fun or told jokes at her expense. He had just sat and spoke, like she usually did to others. He was nice and not at all beastly.

And if she was wrong on all of that, she mused; _At least he isn't boring._

There was really only one person she could tell this to securely.

Anna Carney. Ginger. Very short. Made Elsa think of a Disney princess, especially in her facial features.

Anna was Elsa's sole best friend in the world and in many ways was a surrogate sister. They had known each other since before Elsa could talk. Elsa could not speak until she was 5 years of age. She could actually remember it, not being able to use words.

Anna had been her neighbour and they bonded through being close in living. Elsa remembered that Anna's name attracted her at first. You said 'Anna' with the 'A's' in a higher tone.

Mum was forever making Elsa go out and meet people and play. She hated it. But Anna was always very accommodating. Always inviting Elsa to visit. Always speaking to her and listening to her as well. With time, Elsa began to enjoy Anna's company and she grew attached to her being around. Anna used to visit Elsa when she had no one to visit her, which had been her entire life. Even when Elsa did not want to talk, or help, or really do anything, Anna was there. She was oh-so infinitely kind. Anna did not leave her house much these days, but she was intensely outgoing. Anna found the outside world a big, frightening but exciting place. She was always ventriloquising on her wish to travel, to go to cons and dress up in fancy costumes. She was stuck painfully between having a great, great wish to go out more and see the world and being very scared and tired at once about those efforts.

Anna never used to be like that. Elsa had never thought of Anna as alone in contrast to herself. Not just her, she knew Anna had other friends. Elsa did not always get along with them. But recently Anna had been going out less and less, playing less and less. And not just because their ages dictated they play less. Her other friends noticed this change. It was something that even Elsa could tell.

Elsa feared and worried something else was at play that was making Anna feel this way. She was also afraid she wouldn't be able to help, whatever it was.

The walk to Anna's was swift. She hadn't been in today. She was ill again, Elsa suspected.

_Ah, I'll get her strawberries. That gets her talking more. _

If she knew only one thing with Anna, it was that if she was talkative, that was a good thing. Plus she thought that, to Anna, her talking must be for her personally. They had often spoken about how Elsa missed a lot of cues that others did not. Hence Anna made a point of using words and making sure Elsa got all the information.

The trees by the old church were whistling too as she walked down the village road. The rain had gone away quickly. It made Elsa think of a southern French flood. The leaves were strewn around, the cars passed with great power and a slick 'weese' sound as the wheels passed over the wet tarmac. It was cold as well, and Elsa's jacket was sticking to her skin.

She wanted to pull on the sleeves and relieve her senses but her hands were freezing. It would make her feel worse.

_Why is my body so sensitive?_

Tired and wet was not a nice feeling. Elsa dragged herself to Anna's house as her feet sloshed. The strawberries were pleasantly painless to get.

When Anna's Mother opened the door, she was smiling.

"Hi Elsa. Anna's in."

Her face twitched to slight concern.

"Are you wet, Elsa? Your jacket looks soaked"

Anna's Mother was called Ida.

Elsa liked Ida. Ida was always very sweet and reassuring and made sure Elsa was never lost in an event, like barbecues. She was very much like a second mother and treated Elsa as if she was her own child whenever she went with them to an event, or a show.

"I wanted to get Anna strawberries. Would you like one?" She finished mechanically. She didn't want Ida to take any so that Anna could see the full, unopened box, but she wanted to be kind. She was the guest. To Elsa, it was only fair that she provide something besides herself when visiting the Carneys.

"No, no Elsa, I'm fine. But come in! Get that jacket off; I'll stick it on the heater. And your shoes as well."

Ida helped her take off the items and got to putting them away on the heat.

"Now, ill call your mum and tell her you're here. Are you staying for Dinner?"

Elsa instantly trembled. The still air of the house was no aid, but it was the offer of dinner. Elsa loved having dinner here, but hated imposing.

Elsa gave the heartfelt reply. "I don't want to intrude. So ONLY if it's not to be troublesome. I don't want to annoy you"

Ida jokingly and exaggeratedly rolled her eyes.

"You're always welcome here silly. Now, go up and see Anna."

Elsa nodded. She wished to say nothing more, feeling nothing but grateful.

She climbed the wooden steps she knew so well. She tried to modify her gait. She remembered last time that Anna could tell who was coming up the stairs just by their steps. To Elsa, this was a challenge. 'Clop. Clop. Clop-clop.'

She arrived and knocked on Anna's door.

"Come in, Elsa"

_Damn, she could tell yet again. I'll get her off guard one day._

Elsa fiddled with the door handle for a while before it granted her entry. The door handles of this house were a constant hurdle.

The sight she found was a not altogether different from her last few visits. The 'feeling' that Anna was there hit her right away.

She lay across the bed. She was painting.

She looked up to see Elsa and smiled with great warmth that made Elsa forget all her worries for a moment. Elsa once again got to know the feeling of being someone's friend in its true unfiltered form.

"Hi Elsa!"

"Hello Anna"

Elsa beamed.

**Authors Commentary:**

**I brought Anna in! I have found a part for her in this story and you will be glad to know that of all my fics, this one is the one I have the most well thought out.**

**Authors Notes:**

**Just in case it is unclear, Elsa and John are aged 12, with John imminently about to turn 13. Anna is 11 and a half.**

**All reviews are good reviews; don't be afraid to say anything.**

**And feel free to ask any questions about the fic. You will get no spoilers though.**


	5. Chapter 5

"You weren't in school today. Are you ill?"

"I was just tired. Anxiety just got too much. I couldn't get out of bed til noon and even then..."

The sigh that followed was wistful.

Anna's room was as it normally was: quite a sprawling place. Half opened art utensils, game cases scattered about while the walls were plastered with posters, from comics to movies. The room had a very homely feel and it was very colourful and welcoming to Elsa.

"Have you eaten?"

"Well, I had some toast earlier." Anna ended it on an inquisitive note, as if seeking approval.

Elsa sat in her preferred position; knees crossed, on the floor between Anna's bookcase and her bed, the window behind Elsa. The rain was still doing a dance on the window and both girls could hear it. It was a comfort to the two.

"I got you some Strawberries."

"OOH, yum. So, what happened today? Anything I should know of?"

"The usual geography boredom. Oh and P.E."

Anna took a strawberry and began to eat it absentmindedly.

"Do you still sit out of P.E?"

Elsa shrugged, not wanting to admit to it. She had told the teachers she was ill and had to sit out of P.E. But she soon noticed the P.E teacher didn't even look as he was handed her exemption slip. And so, no one had caught on.

"Yep"

Anna put on a slightly mothering voice. "Elsa, you can't keep sitting out. They will catch on to it."

"Anna, I know. But I get tired so easily. And all the noise...uh! Makes me want to panic and run away. The noise just...I've told you, it's like my ears are getting stabbed."

Anna turned away from her painting for a moment and looked at Elsa.

"But you aren't going to get used to that unless you do it. That's how you get along with things. Besides, what do you do to make up the time?"

Elsa was forced to remember that Anna no longer did P.E. Her Arm had broken and snapped in twain, with an awful crack. Elsa didn't like recalling it. She became ill not long after and so both spent several weeks out of school. Elsa didn't know what annoyed her more. Being ill or the fact that being ill kept her from seeing Anna. But it was not quite as bad as not getting to see Anna in P.E.

Her question was not difficult to answer.

"Well I just sit there, sometimes I try to sleep but then Nathaniel or one of the others throws a ball in my direction to keep me awake. I really get sick of them. Their noise, their boring jokes, their general lack of hygiene."

"Careful now, you're getting all worked up about nothing."

"It is not nothing, Anna. They pick on me and I don't know why. I want to know. Why me?"

"I don't know, Elsa. You are special."

Elsa sighed with a start and Anna quickly clarified herself.

"Elsa, what I mean is that you are unique. You aren't like other people, you know? You have these abilities. Like your chess obsession. How good are you at that now?"

Elsa honestly thought she wasn't that good. "I'm not terrible"

"Not terrible? Elsa, you're really good. You beat the music teacher, didn't you? Remember, he kept going on and on about how 'adorable' your love of chess was?"

Elsa didn't look at Anna. Not out of shame, but out of a bad sense of guilt. Elsa had great difficulty taking a compliment. It stemmed from her Mum always pointing out to be modest to other people. Don't make them feel stupid. But sometimes Elsa couldn't help it. Beating someone at chess filled her partly with pride at her efforts but also guilt, for making the other person feel less skilled.

"Then you beat him. Twice. In 15 minutes."

"What is your point?"

"Elsa, don't get like that."

"Anna, get to your point."

Anna huffed and pouted a little.

_Suppress it. She doesn't need you mad at her right now._

After an unloved pause, Anna spoke.

"Elsa, what I'm saying is that you don't like what most other people like and you like what most other people don't like. And some people see that as threatening. Because people don't like what they don't understand."

Elsa was very befuddled at Anna's meaning. She sensed a compliment somewhere in her straggly sentences but the central point eluded her and it was beginning to wear her down. She came to Anna to get away from this everyday stumbling block.

"Anna, I don't understand car mechanics but that doesn't mean I dislike them."

_Oh Elsa, you confusing person, you. Always taking things literally._

"Never mind Elsa."

Elsa felt bad. She was stressing Anna. Her friend, who put up with her, and she was being treated so unfairly. How could she be so stupid? Anna was nothing but kind to her and all she could do was miss the point.

"I'm sorry."

"No Elsa. I'm sorry. This damn stress is getting to me. I am terrified of leaving this room. I am sorry, for keeping you in here."

"I came here by choice. This brings me to another thing..." Elsa internally winced. She hoped Anna would leave the previous subject behind and thankfully did. But Elsa paused to collect her thoughts.

"Oh. Come on now; don't leave me in the dark"

Elsa pressed a smile.

"Keep you waiting? Never."

Elsa paused again but found Anna, upon looking up, to be focused on painting. Elsa's breathe was caught and she wondered if she should bother talking. People looked at you when they were listening, even though she didn't.

"Err..."

Anna calmly stated "I'm listening, Elsa."

Satisfied, because it _was_ Anna, after all, she spent about a minute deciding how to word what she was going to say. Anna waited.

"Do you know the new boy?"

"Erm, isn't he called John?"

"Yes him."

Anna narrowed her eyes, as if to pour over her thoughts like files in a folder.

"I haven't said much to him. He's quite lonesome and he seems a bit weird to me."

The look Elsa gave Anna on the word 'weird' hadn't been expected but Anna caught herself being firm.

"Now wait, I don't mean bad weird, I just mean weird. Neutral weird. You know? Bit out of place, bit solitary. He's a bit weird." By now Anna felt like she was offending Elsa and Elsa's even minded reply of "I see" wasn't exactly the reassurance she needed. This little fact was going to bother her for some time yet, she could tell.

"Well, he has been standing next to me in P.E for 3 weeks now and never said a word, so I just assumed he was mute but he occasionally spoke to others so he wasn't. Anyway, today, we had people outside so he and I went out onto the grass as a two and he suddenly began to move around more. His mannerisms changed, his face moved around and then he looked right at me."

"Were you scared? Because of the eye contact?"

"I was. My skin seemed tighter and my face was not well. But I was so curious. I had been noticing this strange boy and the way his hands moved and how he played around and moved his legs. And then suddenly, he said "Hi. I'm John".

Anna was entrapped with this. She felt herself being protective and couldn't help herself.

"Just to say, I'd be careful around him. All sorts of rumours are being spread about him and..."

"Really, Anna? You of all people know that rumours are the currency of fools. Plus HE spoke to me first; he didn't make fun of me, Anna, he was friendly and forward."

Anna wondered just how to tell Elsa that she should be cautious. Anna knew that people made fun of Elsa. She knew who did it. Daryl and so on. And above pity, she felt anger. The teachers were very paternal and kept Elsa from fighting back. Why? Anna abhorred all violence. She was a practical pacifist. But she believed that Elsa had the right to defend herself. Verbally and physically.

This John person may well be nice, but Anna would have to meet him. He was looking to be someone Elsa was propelled towards like severed hair to a drain or paint scrawled over paper.

"In what way was he forward?"

"I'm not sure what you mean. He spoke clearly and made his intentions known."

"And those intentions are?"

"To let me know who he is and that he was not out to get me like the others. He did that thing I do, where I monologue"

She peered at Anna and made a point of staring at her for a moment. It got Anna's attention, but the elder held the gaze for some seconds.

_Ah, she's daydreaming._

"Elsa?"

Then Elsa readjusted to everything.

"Sorry, someone's in your bathroom. The toilet flushing it... distracted my ears."

"Wait, you can hear that?"

"Well yes."

Anna chose not to linger on it.

"Anyway, you were about to say something, were you?"

"Yes. He listened to me and I found myself listening to him. At the end of P.E I daydreamed and got soaked in the rain. But he waited for me by the door. And he let the rain run through his thick hair. His eyes looked warmer, but I could only bear to look for a split second."

Elsa chose her last words carefully

"He smiled at me but what surprised me most was that I smiled back. Oh and he loves words."

"Ok Elsa. So what do you plan to do?"

Elsa rehearsed her response again in her mind. This question, she had indeed expected. She rubbed her stomach and was happier, for getting this bit ready.

"I will wait for him to speak to me by V.E day and if not, I will speak to him then."

"But..." Anna remembered V.E was May 8th. "What do you think he wants?"

The rain had noticeably stopped outside and the armour they had adorned from its noise was gone. Their minds were open and naked to the world once again. Elsa spoke.

"Hopefully, a friend. As I likewise do."

Anna ceased painting and looked at Elsa with eyes pleading.

"Be careful Elsa."

"There are many things I am not, but careful I am."

Anna was worried anyway.

_Exactly, Elsa. Let's hope John is the 'good' sort of strange._

_Diary of John Hardy_

_May 4__th__. Written at 9:03 PM._

_Day started uninterestingly. Spot disappearing. Have gotten over the sensory nightmare of teeth brushing using dads old ear muffs._

_Geography boring as usual._

_Finished Daniel Tammets book. Interestingly written. Was surprised he was actually Christian. (No ones perfect). _

_Still not speaking to Isabel. Hopefully she will find reason to speak to me again but in meantime will rely on Kristoff if i am in need of conversation._

_Sky got cloudy before dark. Did not get a chance to get a proper look at Venus. A shame._

_Turning 13 in June, on the 30th._

_I spoke to the snow coloured girl today. Her name is Elsa Antonia. Antonia. German name. Adopted by Norwegians and name adapted to female name as it appears in her name. _

_Very lovely name. Makes me think of blu-ish snow. I have been terrified of speaking to her. While she herself doesn't scare me, i have waited for an ideal opportunity for sometime now. The noise in the gym area...god. It is a sensory nightmare, and Mother tells me that those idiots at the school cant have me wearing earplugs. So i have been prevented thus far. I was lucked with the chance to go outside. Gorgeous day. Could hear the larks all the way. The wind through the tress and hedges was soothing and i felt compelled to drop my mask and stim._

_Elsa Antonia was with me, so i looked and spoke to her, made introductions. I was afraid to say too much, for fear of coming across as a chatterbox. Was pleased to find she indulges in the same compulsion. Told me at length about murderous twins but regrettably, she stopped herself and apologised. Same nervous tick that i once had. Or still have._

_I find myself interested intensely in her. Judging by her book, her special interest is chess. She doesn't talk much but has a slightly deeper voice than other children. Hair is almost white in colour. Reflects beautifully against the sunlight._

_She is very apprehensive of me but has spoken to precisely no one casually over the last few weeks so i conclude she has no friends at school. Is likely very lonely, but enjoyed going outside just as much as me. I couldn't shut my damn mouth shut the whole time i was speaking to her. Went on about football (even though i hate it) but could think of nothing else at the time._

_I suspect Elsa Antonia may be on the spectrum, but i'd need more time to speak to her... If __Elsa Antonia is open to talking again._

_I wonder if she likes things musical?_

**Authors commentary:**

**I liked this chapter. It was good to establish Elsa &amp; Anna and their relationship. Little else to say.**

**Authors Notes: **

**Right readers, i am going to ask you if i should make the Diary entries a regular feature (say every other chapter). I am more than happy to leave them as infrequent additions or remove them entirely. I only ask because naturally reading someones diary (unless its someone like Anne Frank or Victor Klemperer) is usually not an enthralling literary ride. So i want to know if i should keep going with**** them.**

**Send a message or leave a review about the diary and if i receive too little feedback, i might just make them infrequent or get rid of them. Its up to you.**

**Feel free to leave a review generally and point out anything i could improve or explain better.**


	6. Chapter 6

"So Kristoff how is Sven?"

They had been proceeding throughout the village for some time, while the weather was nice.

John noted before leaving his house that it was Saturday, 5th of May.

"He'll live. That jerk on the motorcycle is no longer allowed to visit though. Just because he CAN scare the crap out of dogs, doesn't mean he should."

"People who hurt animals, through spirit or body, are destined to hurt people."

"Well put."

They had been walking for hours. Kristoff enjoyed talking but not walking, John enjoyed walking and a little talking, so they compromised.

"See. It isn't so bad outside, Kristo, my friend."

Kristoff rolled his eyes at John. He was moody. He was often moody.

"Says the guy who can't be in the same room as a hoover."

"Don't even mess with me on that. The sound of a vacuum cleaner is the sound of a bomb that is going off forever. Like the big bang."

"The big bang?"

John kept talking, more engaged than before.

"Yeah. See the big bang is basically a massive explosion whose shockwave never ended."

"Right. And you know this because?"

He detected slight judgement in Kristoff's tone.

"Because it's interesting", he replied affirming.

Kristoff was getting bored of this line of chat rather fastly.

"Sorry, getting bored, are you?" John said, partly teasing.

"Just a bit, yep."

"Well lucky for you, I need to head to the shops that we are just passing, just now."

"Oh joy."

John stopped and stared at the ground, eyes focused.

"Kristoff, was that sarcasm."

"No John. No, it wasn't."

John decided it was time to be plain with Kristoff. He had tried to be playful and 'jokey' but he could feel himself getting tired of it, and his eye was beginning to twitch.

"Kristoff, I invited you out and you said yes." He raised a finger to pause Kristoff's reply for a second. "AND...I specifically said you were not obligated to."

"John, I am a very short sighted person."

"Actually your vision is quite acute."

"I MEANT..." John passed him an even look, expecting a reply. "That I don't think through my decisions well. I have ADD."

John now turned and looked at him, pushing the sides of his leather jacket aside. "Attention Deficit Disorder or not I still did not force you to come out and I have ADHD, so I understand and would have understood before we left."

Kristoff raised his arms then dropped them, as if to make some dramatic motion.

"There's an 'H' in there. What I'd give to have that."

John had however spotted a twin pair of braids that were focusing on him to his right. He would not have noticed if he were not working so hard not to look at Kristoff. John didn't like to argue with people a lot. It was not out of compassion for others, he just hated the idea of losing them.

"At least the hyperactivity part gets you moving and doing things outside."

John was trying to listen and look at separate things.

"Kristoff, you stay in that house out of choice."

Kristoff huffed as John began to quite leeringly look away.

"Look John, I'm going home. We'll do something else tomorrow. Go camping or something."

"Yes fine ok."

Kristoff was incensed. Outside this shop, people were beginning to look at the looker and the irritated blonde boy who was 14 and looked 16. Kristoff was very solitary and people tended to make maintaining it difficult.

_He's ignoring me again. Why do I even listen to him?_

"You won't even look at me."

The ginger-haired girl got closer, still looking at John.

"You keep pushing me out and its pissing me off. Taking me on pointless walks for no reason."

John was hardly listening to Kristoff. He was deep in thought. Some part of his brain still registered Kristoff.

"Listen Kristoff you are right. I think we will perhaps have to speak about Isabel."

He looked at him, pulling his lenses from the ginger girls'.

"Later. At yours."

Kristoff had been noticing the ginger haired girl too.

He and John did a dance of looks. First the blonde looked to the ginger, then back at the brown haired boy he called his friend. His buddy.

Then John looked at Kristoff. John had no idea what he was actually doing, but then Kristoff nodded and next thing he knew, Kristoff was walking away.

John was perplexed.

This perplexing wasn't helped by the freckling, 4 foot 5 blue eyed girl who now stood, smiling at him.

_Oh Jesus, why is she smiling? _

His intuition told him the smile was a veil.

Earlier that day.

Anna awoke to the sound of cars. No rain.

Her bed was many grains of dirty but she felt no temptation at all to make it, or even move herself from it. She felt like she was adrift at sea in a raft.

Anna was feeling dizzy this morning. She felt dizzy most mornings.

_Uh. Time. What does it matter what time it is? _

And yet she looked at the time, similar to how a sign proclaiming a wall to be wet will still urge the reader to touch it, despite its implied pointlessness.

1:13 Pm

Saturday.

_Great. Sleeping schedule is ruined. If there was one to ruin._

She pulled herself from her bed and placed her DS under the pillow, where it should have lain when she went to sleep.

Anna did not even want to survey the room. Why bother? It would just make her feel more tired and useless than she already did. She was in no mind to think or reflect right now.

Hardly any strawberries were left.

_Ah, that's right. Elsa was over. We must have talked for a while._

The lack of most strawberries told her she and eaten voraciously, which she tended to do when she was in conversation. Anna felt a little better for it. But not by much.

_When did she last visit? A month ago? I don't even know._

Anna's sense of time had long ago eroded as an effective function of her brain. She simply could not seem to stick to a schedule, or task. All she could do to rile herself from motionlessness was to paint when she didn't feel awful at it and play videogames when she could be bothered. Elsa sometimes sounded about feeling similar, but Anna knew her reason was different.

Everything was a chore. Nothing mattered yet everything mattered. Anna was sitting on her floor, her paints untouched.

She wanted to paint something for Elsa. Her birthday was many months away, but Anna knew she would be intensely slow with making it. She had until December 21st. Plenty of time. But even then it seemed to not be enough for Anna. She had no idea how to start it. A snowflake? She knew Elsa liked to mark certain dates in her mind and December 21st was the winter solstice.

Then Anna lay back on the carpeted floor. She couldn't do this for Elsa. Not until she remembered the night previous.

Anna remembered that Elsa had met someone, which she knew wasn't common.

_But then I never go to see her. So what would I know?_

Nonetheless, she recalled it was that strange boy, John. She had seen him a few times around the village. He always had a pencil with him when he was in the village proper and rolled over his fingers in a pattern. Anna knew he was quiet, but not quite lonely. At the very least he didn't give off much. He was always staring and his eyes were intense. His head was often seen slooping slightly downwards too.

Anna recalled seeing all of this from her window. Was he ill? Did he have some kind of mental disorder?

_Not like mines. Mines is a prison._

The thought of Elsa meeting this individual scared Anna. Everything that was outside the walls of her room seemed to frighten her. She knew, she KNEW, it was simply a paper-thin terror. But was it?

This thought only made her confinement seem all the more pathetic and selfish. She wasn't scared of John but of how Elsa might react if he did something she wasn't used to.

Elsa needed forewarning for all sorts of things. She only acted on whims when she felt completely secure in what she was doing.

Anna thus found herself wondering the same thing Elsa had: Why Elsa?

Anna crawled upright and ricketed towards her window. Her brain was slowly waking up.

Anna was Elsa's best friend, but she wasn't Anna's sole friend. There was Maxine who Anna was super close to. They were both fans of musicals and especially plays. But they hadn't met in some time. Maxine was older, at about 14 and she liked to volunteer to do work for experience, but it meant she had little free time. She and Anna didn't meet much these days, but occasionally texted each other. Anna liked it. It staved off the silence for a while.

For Anna, Elsa was special in the greatest way compared to her other friends. Anna saw Elsa's eccentricities as advantages. Elsa was not like Sherlock Holmes, but she would notice little changes in Anna's room, even ones Anna didn't know she performed.

_Anna, you cleaned that old paint stain on the carpet that I first saw about a year and a half ago._

_Oh Anna, your trophy is closer to the edge of the table. Did you knock it over and put it back?_

_It's so good to see that drawing on the wall. It wasn't very appealing trapped in your drawer._

Elsa's difficulties to Anna were her lack of tact and common sense.

Elsa saw no strangeness in wearing the same clothes for five days in a row, even when she started to look decrepit.

And it wasn't because Elsa was necessarily 'unclean'. She simply seemed to not notice. Anna knew that finding clothes for Elsa was a nightmare. The blonde was never satisfied with how they felt. And how they looked, she didn't mind, but there were certain colours Elsa didn't like wearing, especially yellow.

Elsa was quite plain speaking and had been for as long as she could talk. Anna liked it when they were discussing things Anna could use clarity on. She spoke most openly with Anna and it was easy to tell. Elsa was very truthful and found something almost impossible about lying. But she could tolerate not saying things. And she would lie if she thought it would protect Anna but the girl clearly struggled with it. Elsa just wasn't good at taking the temperature of a situation and concluding she needed help.

This also meant embarrassment for others that Anna couldn't help. She recalled Elsa meeting her friend Nicholas for the first time half a year earlier.

_Nicholas, is your hair supposed to be like that? It looks like string. _

To Elsa it was fine and even proper to ask.

_But Anna, would you rather I told him a lie? I was curious._

_But Elsa, sometimes it's best to say nothing._

_Why?_

Anna could only ever say it was 'nice' to do it. But Elsa was simply too recalcitrant to that idea. Anna couldn't make Elsa see being opinion-surpassingly nice as a positive thing. She constantly had to see through it. But even this, Anna admired a little. Elsa was stubborn and stubborn about things not enough people were.

When Daryl was picking on Anna a summer earlier, Elsa suddenly stood upright and calmly told him "Stop annoying her."

"Or what, what you gonna do?"

"I will kick you. And kick you again. And I will keep doing it until you no longer move."

Daryl did not find this impressive, but he was getting bored of his mockery, so sulked away.

It was brave of her. Anna could never seem to forget it. Elsa would have been physically beaten if Daryl chose. Then again, even he was rarely that beastly.

But Elsa, for better or worse, had no understanding of the idea that someone should be expected to do something in certain contexts while discouraged from it in others. Elsa seemed to live a life that needed no context and never sought one, from Anna's point of view.

_And yet this John person, you know nothing about._

But then Anna came to a small discovery; what if Elsa is aware of the risks? Anna had constantly been thinking about what John _might _do, not even a fizzle towards what Elsa might think and want.

_Anna, you aren't her Mother. Don't be her Mother._

Anna did not entirely get along with Elsa's mother.

_I wonder if this mothering is to make up for something. Guilt? Yeah, guilt. I'm too pathetic for anything else._

Anna sat on her bed and soon lay down. Her little extract down the path of the past had made her dizzy even more. She would take some time to recover.

_Whatever is wrong with me, I will be here for Elsa. _

_How? By sitting in this room and sulking?_

She put her hands to her face, to make sure she hadn't shed a tear.

Then her Mother shouted up with dreadful sharpness: "Anna, I need you to go to the shops. Your dads at work and I'm away out. Get up."

Anna choked out an affirmative reply and went to look in the mirror. She hated the sight at first, but smiled her best smile. She still wasn't pleased.

_I guess this will have to do._

After spending as much time as she dared not moving, she finally arched over to the door and flung it open. Down the stairs she dropped in small integers.

She was not smiling.

_Elsa's Notebook:_

_May 5__th__._

_I am..._

She tried to will herself to write something to read. The notebook had been given to her many years before. She had mostly filled it with chess diagrams and records of moves in past games. There weren't many free pages left. Elsa was further annoyed at the lack of lines to write along.

_I met a new person. His name is John._

For a moment all she wanted to do was cross out the words. But she decided to leave them. She closed the book with a flick of the wrist.

She didn't have the words to use yet. She wasn't ready to set her thoughts to paper. She didn't feel even a touch confident about it.

_I need to read more in order to write at all, she_ thought.

She couldn't focus on sitting still. She was cracking her fingers and tapping her foot quite violently. She was restless. She had to do something. Something to get her mind off of her bad feelings about writing.

_This is why ADHD is annoying. Uh. I want to work but would rather do something else. I want to run, to jump. My body wants to. But I want to read and write._

Elsa did spy her Violin. It was sitting in the corner, uncased and painted with dust. Elsa felt bad right then. It was a gift to her, from her mother. Yet she hadn't touched it for months. It often happened. She would move from interest to interest with quite a sudden swiftness. Chess had taken over every side activity. But it was beginning to ebb away since her dad didn't play as much.

She picked up the Violin.

And Elsa played until the sun came down. She was on another plane and in another part of her brain.

She eventually bored of it and put the instrument down with renewed care.

_That, _she thought_, must be what it is like to be content. _

But Elsa stopped rubbing her stomach quite quickly when the sounds of the house returned to her, the clock especially. It was windy outside and Elsa could feel her brain fogging up again with indecision. She was still bored. Something was lacking.

_And you are still alone._

Elsa set up the chess board with no intent to play. But she did it automatically. Like a robot.

She did not see it, she only heard it. But outside her room, the vicious clock was striking 12.

**Authors Commentary:**

**Hello there. Wow, I've never had a story that has such a dedicated and continuous following from some readers before. Thank you so much. I hope I can continue to please and possibly impress.**

**This is also the longest single chapter I've written for any of my stories.**

**Authors Notes:**

**I am reminded of Ben Croshaws criticism of GTA V. He said its biggest fault is "Nothing happens. It's just a load of people doing stuff." I doubt Mr Croshaw and I would get along for other reasons. Nonetheless, I have been hearing it in my mind with each new addition to this story. So I hope to change things up a bit. I haven't decided how yet.**

**Here's a good way to put it: George.R. talked once about the two kinds of writer; the gardener and the architect. I am very much of the gardening variety. I have an idea of where I am going, I know what I want to put to paper, but the getting there is an open field. Look it up, it's a fascinating interview.**

**I will update, as before, when I can. Review if you wish.**


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: My long absence is detailed at the end.**

"Ah. You and I haven't met yet have we?"

"No, I suppose we have not."

John stood there awkwardly. As far as he was concerned, this ginger haired girl had the right of way.

"Were you about to go in...or?" She gestured gingerly towards the door.

John turned around to see the shop door.

"Oh, yes, yes I was. Were you?"

_Dont scare her off. At least not until you know what she wants. If she even 'wants' anything. Am I overthinking this?_

"Yep."

With that, John painfully walked towards the shop door and entered. The movement suddenly seemed more tiresome than it did a minute ago.

The girl was right behind him. He was getting anxious over what to do. There was no nice way to ask someone what they wanted when you didn't know them so far as he knew. People unlike himself tended to read a lot into how things were said. It made him want to yawn. He would just have to wait.

He looked over the sweets and chocolates and muttered to himself.

"No, no...no, too chewy. No...oh god, no."

Eventually he settled on a chocolate bar and was frightened from his search when the girl spoke behind him: "You don't want something from lindt? It's AMAZING."

John skilfully kept himself steady.

"I would love to. But they help an organisation I am opposed to."

"Oh right." She miffed.

John's patience was thinning. It had been thinning since he had first spotted her. Thinning much like his father's hair did; too quickly and with embarrassing self-awareness. He was trying to figure out what the girl wanted, how to approach her about it, and at the same time trying to create an excuse not to go to Kristoffs. His thoughts were getting stretched thin and the close quarters of the shop were no help.

He stood behind the girl and waited to pay for his snack. He already knew he wouldn't eat it for hours yet. He wasn't in the mood now. The volume of thoughts and motions combined were giving him too much to contend with and his stomach hated him.

"I'm Anna, by the way."

_Hmm, I like the way that 'A' sounds. AAA-nna._

John waited on a second name. But none came.

"Ah. I'm John. John Hardy. You are Anna...whom?"

Anna stared at him. At this range he was feeling a sense of weight about his features that wasn't there before. She was totally dead eyed. Then quite abruptly she broke into a laugh.

"Hahaha, sorry. I'm having a strange morning. You must be a bit confused. I'm Anna Carney."

_Carney_

Johns brain made a trip to a subject he knew somewhat.

"Carney. That's an Irish name. As is mine."

Anna's face showed a look of recognition. John was relieved.

_Finally, a common patch of earth. _He held his breath and paid for his chocolate as wordlessly as he dared and turned around to see Anna waiting by the door. John mistook her waiting for someone outside heading in.

"SO it is. My dad is Irish born and I have like 50 cousins there or something. And yet I've never been. Haha, shame on me."

John stood listening. His stillness felt unwarranted and he was proved right.

"Well, you coming?"

John suddenly realised what she was doing.

"Oh. I am sorry. I thought..." His voice dipped in volume with each word and he hoped she would skim over it. She did. In a second they were outside in the scorching sun. It was unusual for May, John thought.

Anna found it uncomfortable. And she didn't feel equal to looking up to the sky. If there were no clouds, she didn't want to know that.

"When did you join our school?"

"About a month ago, I say." He was trying to say as little as possible. People spoke to you when they had a motive, normally.

"Oh right. Well I haven't seen you because I went and broke my arm. The cast has been off recently but it still hurts."

He was looking straight ahead, no emotions trickling into his voice or his face.

"I am sorry to hear it. How did it happen?"

She paused. She had not had to explain in some time.

"Fell off my bike."

John was surprised, but not saddened. His inner self doubt was with him each moment as they were walking down the street. He had scripts for this. You said "how are you" and "I'm fine" even if you weren't fine and even if you didn't care how the other person felt.

_They think all these rules with words and speech will protect them. From whom? Us?_

In a longer pause he forced the words forward and looked, peering to see where they landed in the contextual battle ground.

"Should I tell you a bit about myself?"

And with that, he stopped and pivoted around to Anna, who he had been walking ahead of. Outwards went his hand.

"Um yeah, ok."

She shook his hand after a moment's hesitation, finding the gesture sudden. He remained where he was and seemed to memorise bits and pieces about himself, collecting from a complex archive of facts, knowledge, and ages. He considered all people, even buffoons, to be complex and in at least one shade interesting. But due to his own ego, he considered himself the most complex of all, on good days. On bad days, not so much.

"I am John Hardy. I am 12 years, 11 or so months. My favourite colour is purple; I have brown hair and brown eyes..." He was to be off on a sort of speech and Anna tried to be engaged. ..."and yes, those features are as boring to me as they are to you..." _Is that a joke? He did smile saying that... "_...I am autistic, have ADHD and this thing called synaesthesia. That last one is quite complicated...in fact they all are..." He then seemed to gain some awareness of what was outside his thoughts again "...anyway, sorry, sometimes I monologue and it gets a bit muddled, up, like a crap painting or bad hair. "

He fidgeted mercilessly to the point that Anna actually wondered if he was injuring himself. He looked positively manic, like a tom baker cosplayer. His voice was evidently on the deep side of breaking.

"It's alright. Really, that was...um, informative. So those three things, you mentioned you have, what...what are they?"

_Wow, I haven't felt this dumb in 20 minutes. _

_Ha-bloody-ha, Anna. You're so nice to yourself._

John stopped smiling and his hands went inward. He seemed momentarily lost and even a little scared. Like he had been asked to look after someone's child.

"Sorry, but those are big questions and I don't have the time. It's like asking an ant to comprehend god."

Anna looked confused now.

"Oh, I'm sorry; I don't mean you are stupid, I just mean you have NO idea what you are asking."

Anna found his missteps somehow adorable and he had put her in a good mood, even if he didn't mean to. Her little side quest was not exactly paying off as planned. But then Anna wasn't the planning type. Plus she had things to take back to the house.

_You lazy girl. You haven't even asked him anything about Elsa!_

John gazed at his watch then peered into the sky, rather than just at it. He took a deep breath, looked at Anna and found his face again. He was like a bad juggler with several poorly fitting masks.

Before Anna could speak, John beat her to it.

"I am afraid I must depart, time is short..."

_I just lied to her and I'm not quite certain as to why._

...and I have a friend I need to meet.

_Hopefully not._

"If you want, we can meet again and I'll try to explain one of my three...ill call them quirks. Do you know where the railway is?"

_Christ, he talks fast._

"Yeah, the old one, hedged by trees. You want to meet there?"

"Yes, if that's possible, it's one of my favourite places here thus far. Noon tomorrow?"

"Ok, we can do that."

Each was about ready to turn away and walk and Anna hated it. For as strange as this boy was, he was interesting and up close he seemed mostly harmless. His hands danced a lot though, for sure. She didn't want to leave but she had to.

"Before I do, Anna, I must ask, why did you talk to me?"

Anna had the foresight to see this was Johns 'way' of saying things. An echo of Elsa, in a way.

"Well, you seemed nice enough and I wanted to say hi."

_You just lied to him and I'm not even sure why. _

_Wait, did you even lie?_

John looked no different than before the question was asked.

"Just one more thing, John."

He froze. He didn't like hearing his name in most tones of inquisition.

"Yes?"

"Why did you start speaking to Elsa?"

_Bugger. What are the words for this?_

"Well...I guess because I was standing next to her in P.E for weeks and I got more comfortable with her over time. Plus, she isn't boring. Very sleepy though, most of the time."

_Sleepy? Oh Elsa, you and I are having words._

"Ah ok. Goodbye."

And swiftly she turned away before he could ask anything about her asking. John was so befuddled and set off-center by everything that he didn't have the clearness of thought to say anything. By the time he came to, she was far away.

_Hmm..._

_Well what a lovely, if terrifying person. I hope people approaching me isn't going to become a regular thing._

_Wait._

_Who the hell was that?_

The Next Day

"Elsa."

She heard her Mother. But she wish she had not. She was in an ideal plateau of attention, reading the first Harry Potter book. She was not finding it all that grabbing but she was lost in it. It was strange; to be lost in something you care little for. She didn't find much to like in Harry, and even Ron wasn't really making her want to like him. She liked Hermione a little better. But she much preferred the descriptions of the story, like most books of fiction before it she had read. She did aim to read more books after this one. Her Mother had little else available though. The Hogwarts world was so vast but measurable. Elsa wondered how long it must have taken for the writer to build it.

_This is why you aren't writing stuff. It scares you. How big it can be. How much there is to build._

"ELSA."

_Speaking of scares._

Elsa left the book upturned and stood up fast, making her way to the door. She was in a lost trance through the movement. Her head had to give up quite a deal of energy to convince her legs that moving was worth a damn.

She remembered how she almost passed out laughing from a thought she had where the limbs, organs and brain were all actually in a constant argument with each other over what should get energy. She wasn't sure why, but it made her cackle insanely, which her Mum often said was strange to do on her own.

The door was made open.

"Sorry mum, I was reading."

"I was wondering. Those Bat ears of yours aren't as deaf as you might like them to be Elsa."

_Ha! If only you knew, mum. You would eat a door to stop the noise._

And so her Mother began distributing clothes into drawers and in the cupboard. Elsa never failed feeling a string of guilt when she witnessed this. She never said a word unless spoken to and wanted to help but she was too afraid of changing things. She liked things as they were.

Then she heard the sound of little wooden shapes being cast from their precious parapets.

"Leave those." Elsa almost spat. The chessboard was set a very specific way.

Her mother, without turning to Elsa, kept at it. "Elsa, don't leave them scattered about like that. What do I keep telling you?"

"But Mum, I set the taken pieces in an order. Chess is a game about order. The pieces have to be placed by hierarchy."

Elsa sounded like a teacher and her Mother was not a fan. Elsa's hands turned to passive and useless fists as she saw her Mother still moving the pieces.

"But these ones are taken, you said. Off the board."

Elsa decided to show her Mum instead.

"No Edina, like this." Her Mother writhed visibly at her name being used. Elsa only used it to mean business.

Elsa then proceeded to quite clumsily put the pieces in a semblance of order, upwards and downwards on her brown "Collection desk" as she named it. She wanted to annoy her Mother into leaving while also seeming clever. It usually worked.

"See? Queen first, valued at 9, the king is more valuable but you can't take a King. Then the Rook or Castle, valued at 5. Bishop and Knight are valued at 3 and pawns are worth one each. I put them in order because it feels right and proper."

Elsa did not turn to look at her Mum, but she could sense with a stab-in-the-dark feel for the mood of the room; Edina was lost.

"Ok Elsa. But you can't leave them all over the table like that. You keep doing that, you will get used to it, and then there's no space for other things. It will make you untidy, I'm telling you."

Elsa could probably count with three hands the lack of logic in that summing up. But she never argued with Mum. Not Mum. Not just out of an understanding respect that Elsa had to work not to question openly but also out of a very vague fear. Her Mum didn't hurt her physically or punish her unjustly. Elsa really believed she was treated quite fairly, in fact.

But she still would hold her tongue when it was practically bleeding with words to speak. Elsa found very few things in life that could make her panic at all times and all places if it was triggered. She found a great deal of life aggravating and tensing. But panic, no: You needed Edina's temper for that.

"Oh, open that package you got, would you?"

Elsa peered briefly at the plain white box.

"The teacher gave it to me. It will be work."

"Elsa, she said it was from someone else, weren't you listening."

"I was not listening."

Her mum sighed. Elsa was always on her own plane.

"Now, its tea time soon."

"How many minutes?"

"15, darling. Ok?"

"Yes." Elsa completed with a nod. Edina paced passed the raised bed and out of the room she was. Elsa wondered if life was always like this. Watching people to ensure you didn't anger them. Elsa had been like that. Until she was six she was quite violent. But she didn't enjoy it. She found herself going back to it.

_I just...didn't know how it all happened. What life was. Well, I still don't. But back then, I was ruled by fear. These interests, they are quite cool. But they keep disappearing. Space...where did that go? 30 books, maths, staying up to watch The Sky at Night. All of it, I left it to gather dust._

_If I keep getting bored of things that were once my world, what can I hope to accomplish with others?_

_Even if I do find a friend, even if John is that friend, what use is it if I wake up one day and find him boring? I can't do that to him. To anyone._

_I would see Anna everyday if I didn't think I might one day no longer find new things to talk about with her. That's my curse. The deeper I swim, the shallower it gets. And the rain is not always heavy enough to keep things interesting._

_I need more rain._

Anna loved rain. Elsa inherited that love. But Anna could never know why Elsa loved it. It was a metaphor for her. Of boredom being drowned.

_I've always had Anna, but I can't always see her. If I get bored of her...life isn't worth living. Hell, she's practically my Sister._

Elsa had been standing with her hands tightly clenched together. Elsa suddenly stopped. She remembered. The package she had been given. A strange kind of gift?

She tore it open and found a small book, with lines and blank pages. Elsa was confused. She found paper taped to the back of it.

It read:

_Hello, Elsa Antonia. This is John. I did like our little parlay today under the sun. I'm writing this just as the class is concluding and your books seem rather sparse. You hate the look of those garish red disasters made of crap paper. Anyway, I was given this gorgeous blue notebook from an aunt, but blue is not my thing. I find it too much. Plus I have enough as it is to write upon. So I figured I'd give it to you, as a gift. Yes, strange to do, considering we haven't even known each other a day. But I don't need the book, you need something new to write with and I want to show you I am sincere. Plus the colour blue is seen as 'fresh' culturally. I hope our relationship, whether as acquaintances or friends, will be fresh in outlook also._

_Sorry if I am being too proud and flagrant of social norms and creeping you out, feel free to return it if so. Otherwise, enjoy. Keep doing chess charts. Write facts. Or start a Diary._

Elsa looked at the note. She was indeed surprised, but oh so pleasantly. She went from having no kind of friend at school to one who gave her a gift.

John was quite dramatic. It made Elsa want for caution. But on the other hand, what had she to lose? He talked too much, same as her. He was awkward, quiet and did strange things in patterns. Elsa was not unlike him when she considered it.

_Hmm. I don't know anything about people. Remember "What the other people are here for, I have no idea." I am just like that. _

Elsa smirked.

_But then, am I really here to help others?_

She looked down at the notebook. It was indeed beautiful. And he was right. The blue was amazing. Her favourite colour.

_God, I should write all these thoughts down._

She was hesitant. Very hesitant. But she found in the notebooks spine a pen. She breathed in deeply. She wasn't ready. She had no clue what to say. And yet...

_Sunday 6__th__ of May..._

**Authors Commentary: I am very very very sorry. Allow me to briefly explain why this took so long. Firstly, the very next day after chapter 6 I had work to do and it was a week long thing, pretty much. Then, when I finally had a free day, I fell badly ill the day before that, and I could not function all weekend. Then, I had things in college to do this week as I recovered. I have been adding to this piece by piece since Monday (I had written the first 1000 words ahead of time) and it is my longest chapter ever, thus far. I hope that can offset the wait a little bit.**

**So again, I am sorry for the delay. I promise it won't be this long again for the foreseeable future. **

**Authors Notes: In regards to chronology, I try to be as consistent as I can. But please let me know if I mess up the dates or any such things in the story. I am only human.**

**As before, I will update when I can (And sooner than this time).**


	8. Chapter 8

Sunday was a rainy day. It was light and John imagined the sound of rain on the concrete as being like licks. The sky was constantly dark, even at this time. It was going on 1 Pm and he was all ready.

_Notebook/Diary. Check. _

_Bottle of Irn Bru. Check._

_Pen. _

_Blanket. (Mother insisted.) _

_Sunglasses. Vanity has its uses._

_Watch._

_Shotgun Shell and Hammer._

_All-important Leather Jacket_

The rain was very light but John gauged it from the window. He didn't like the humidity. The garden was dying. The rain, it was doing nothing to it. Weed everywhere, the cabbages were dying and John didn't have the knowledge of hwo to tend to them. It depressed him and he decided it was best to leave, just to kill that memory.

The sun still shone on occasion through the overcast, dead sky. It bothered him. He did not like things being so hot and yet wet. It made all the air feel like an unpleasantly hot room with no ventilation.

Still, he had to get out. He and his Mother were still not quite on speaking terms and Anna's talk with him yesterday had left him with nothing to do. He decided she would stave off the boredom and maybe even be interesting.

_Uh. I have gotten to the stage of meeting basic strangers. If she even meets me._

But he stayed safely tucked away in almost ignorance of what he was heading towards. He could take advantage of an exceptional single-mindedness, writing things down being his favourite one. But it was hard to get out of all at once. He knew his mind was just not all that good and sudden, jerking changes in focus and attention were common. While he knew it was an advantage, it left him envious of multi-taskers. He could think about several things over time, but he had to be relaxed and it took him sometimes hours at a time.

Packing his bag took an hour. Each item was carefully thought about. His notebook never took long. He liked to have his history close at hand. He wrote down too many notes and depended on them too much. He had a good long term memory. But his short term was child-like.

With ADHD, everything was a potential explosive thought pattern. He could go through an intense series of ideas but suddenly come out of his stupor completely forgetting what he was thinking about. But he had started his diary two years earlier. Isabel encouraged him to do it and they each thought it helped his memory, his attentive-ness and such a great deal. He initially did it for her, but with time got more out of it than just appeasing her.

Maybe he was getting better. But his head still hurt from it all. He was so sensitive, especially through sound.

As he turned off the road and headed down the decaying railway, fields on each side, he remembered why he was trekking here.

_Meeting new people. God, a lot of bad memories in that department. Even Elsa I am worried. Am I getting overzealous? Am I making up for some recent error?_

There were people ahead, the look of which he was not keen. Two grown men.

_Listen, son...you have to not trust men and still be a man worth trusting, ok?_

His mother's words rang out. And then he thought about that. He passed them, with a chill he couldn't shake. He was getting distinctly uncomfortable and wished to fast travel to where he was going. All he could now do was worry about little things. He hated it when little things bugged him. Like bugs, they were building and the wind seemed to pick up along the tree tunnel. The sun became much too bright and the rain momentarily got heavier.

_Wait..._

Why would Anna be so quick to meet him after his meeting Elsa? Why had this not occurred to him before? Then, for brief moments, his pace stilted and he panicked over what was ahead. He thought of everything and in the end he found himself on his knees, nearly manic, because he was thinking it over too much. His head began to throb. It was a dangerous thing, to think of just how much _might_ happen.

_What if I hurt Elsa? But how? Why am I so concerned? Am I being scary? Am I..._And on and on he went. He could not walk in time. This feeling, it was unlike anything he had ever felt besides it. He had felt it before. Times before. The distress was everywhere. And he had no comfort in anything. Not even in his bag.

_Left my stim toy. Of course._

His tinnitus began to build as the rustling trees, gravelly stone and licking rain drove him to a state of overdrive. He was powerless. His senses were overpowered. And here he was, keeled over and covering his ears.

Then he felt a touch on his shoulder. He jerked wildly and fell backwards and exposed his ears once again to the world. While he waited for the world to consume him, he heard a lighter sound. It was pleasant and new. It forced him to think of the sun. Lucky old sun.

Happy act. Next he knew he opened his eyes and the wind suddenly stopped its hissing and he began to untense his hands. They were in very strong pain.

"John? Are you ok?"

_Who is that?_

"I'm scared."

He counted the second to the next second, waiting and waiting for something to be said. He was being blinded by the sun.

"Why are you scared, John?"

He was now beginning to see. The sun must have stalked behind a cloud.

"The wind."

"Is it making you feel cold?"

"No."

He tensed much less when he noticed the rain had stopped. He could not hear it or feel it on his paling cheeks. He was pathetically glad of it.

"The noise?"

"_yes."_

The definition returned to his eyes. He could see a rose coloured top of something. After a few seconds, he could see it was a person. Their hands were clasped together. But it was another moment before he realised that it was Anna. He also had not noticed his landing on his posterior.

Once he realised it was Anna, he was still stressed, but not quite scared.

"Anna, did you touch me?"

He could see her lower her head slightly. It was tied up. Her hair, he thought.

"I did tap your shoulder to see if you were alright." Anna felt bad instantly. He didn't like to be touched, clearly.

"Please do not do that again. I was panicked and scared and touching me can make me lose control of my sense of self."

_Nice going Anna._

"I'm sorry; I wasn't sure what to do. You had your hands on your ears and you looked very pale. I wasn't sure what to do so I just thought you were thinking."

John suddenly became aware of himself and he stood up unnaturally quickly, his leather jacket cascading down to almost his knees. Anna suppressed a grin. He looked like a child-bodied adult.

He stuck his finger in each ear and then caressed his hands. He stretched his back, stamped his feet a few times and then stroked his hair. He blinked rapidly and then looked at Anna, though she could tell not quite on her eyes.

"It is alright, you did not know. What you just witnessed is what is called 'Sensory Overload'. It is when the mind and body gets overloaded with sound, light, touch...basically what we perceive. When it happens, it can make me panic."

Anna was not as surprised as she thought. She was surprised at her lack of it. Paradoxically, she was shocked at how John had acted. She didn't want to be, but it was not to be helped. John was unaware of all of this.

"Shall we make steps towards taking steps?" He wanted to make light of things.

"Wait, what?"

John's hands went in his pockets.

"Never mind. It was a bad joke. Now, you know this place better than me, is there any decent place to eat like one would a picnic?"

Anna thought for a moment then remembered that at the end of the railway there was a bench. It was placed there for hill walkers and the like. The railway had, after all, been out of service since at least 1960. She explained this to John.

"Oh well perfect, we shall head there. If you are ok with it?"

While saying this he leaned into her slightly and for a moment she was distracted with him. There was a pause. Then she realised. "Oh yeah, its fine, sounds like a great idea. Yep. Let's go there. Follow me."

And with this she smiled for the first time, properly.

The walk itself was quite long and they made talk small. John learned about Anna's interests. She liked reading, had previously been a dancer but quit after she developed trouble with her balance. He wasn't forward enough to ask what it was.

He told her about himself, what he liked, his former obsession with names, that he wrote a lot and had been around a few town nearby before moving to the small but not unremarkable village of Arndell (He preferred the older spelling: Arendelle). He tried so stay off the topic of himself as much as he could, as he didn't like to indulge it. He was too easily brought down by it.

He was surprised how often he mentioned his mother.

In the end, the subject inevitably came up; what is autism?

It was a subject John liked to talk about and indeed it was, in a sense, his primary quality. He had decided when he met Isabel to from then on answer any questions about it he could and had done voracious reading on the subject. He disliked ignorance. But he also knew he was young and wouldn't be taken seriously. So Anna presented an uncommon opportunity, being closer in age to him.

"Now, are you sure you want to hear about this? It could take time?"

Anna thought for a moment. Autism was not completely outside her attention. She knew of it, but only understood it to be that some of them couldn't talk. She never knew many of them.

She had mentioned it to Elsa once but the blonde didn't know what it was and Anna was honestly not that interested.

Now she was.

"Yeah. Tell me about it. It'll help me understand you better."

But already this seemed like an over-reaction. Like she was acting too quickly. How altered things were to be had John made clear he felt the same. But he still found it exhilarating.

"Autism is a state of mind. It is, technically, a mental disorder that one is born with. It is not contagious or any such nonsense.

It was first researched properly by a man named Hans Asperger in, I think, 1944. That is where the soothing but euphemistic title 'Aspergers' came from. His research was largely unknown however, and people like us, where we could be found, were usually put to asylums and other places if we couldn't adapt to other people."

He brought out an A4 notebook, evidently quite well used, and opened it. After a moment he wordlessly opened a certain page.

"It has various qualities to it. We quite like routine, for example. To remember mine I wrote it on the first 15 pages of this notebook. It says:

_Teeth, then face._

_Dress. _

_Turn off radio. _

_Check watch. _

_Shoes. _

_Leather jacket. _

_Go through pockets and see what I need. _

_Notebook, bag, out of door._

It took me weeks to get that all memorised. That's partly because of my ADHD but that is for another time. Anyway, Autism is a different form of the human mind. We have various qualities to us that make us unique but also mean we struggle to cope with the world. What you earlier was sensory overload. My ears, hearing, it is quite acute. I know, or can at least guess, that Elsa Antonia is a bit like that."

He decided not to mention her again, unless asked. He didn't want to seem single minded on Elsa.

"We have things called special interests. This is when we take a strong and encyclopaedic knowledge and interest in something. My current one is...well, I'm not sure. I used to have one with names, though, and I have books on where they come from, how they are formed and so on. Irish and Scandinavian names were always my favourite.

Our chief disadvantage, or at least the one we come across most, is physical communication.

This is reading faces, analysing voices, that sort of thing."

He had been looking the whole time at his book and did not even look up at her. But he was obviously invested in what he was saying. He occasionally nervously laughed and even made hand gestures. But it made him look strange, she thought. She made sure to listen, if only he might ask questions about it afterward.

Then she felt bad. She realised she was actually becoming enthralled.

"You have no idea how difficult it is to understand people sometimes. How easily it all just becomes noise. Autistic people are not attune to subtly. Some of them might be, but most of us aren't. We like things obvious and clear cut. Phrases like "Keep your eyes peeled" can be confusing. Peeling my eyes is not an activity I understand. Of course, it's not meant literally, but for Auties everything is meant literally."

He stopped abruptly and Anna took some time to realise. He was deep in thought. Learning from last time, Anna did nothing. She was proven prudent. John snapped back to her presence and continued. He just needed to think, she thought.

"In my own case, Autism is an advantage. I know few people have it in my life and I like the unique perspective it gives me. I dislike how others understand it, in that they don't. Such people seem to see autism is some curable disease. They think I suffer for existing. They are not wrong.

I do indeed suffer for existing whenever I encounter them. They ensure it.

Another trait of ours is that, unlike 'severe' autism (he used very obvious sarcastic gestures as he understood them. Anna nodded before he continued.) We develop speech unusually. My mother says I never spoke til I was 5 and then suddenly spoke in complete sentences with several syllables. As compliments go, it's long winded from her, but I will take it.

If there is one thing I hope you can learn from me it is that autism is not a disease and not something we wish less of. It is as much a part of me as ones skin and I would die before surrendering it. But I've luckily not had to truly suffer for who I am. Just bullying and idiots with sticks."

His face had turned slightly red and he looked a bit like frowning as he kept talking.

"My mind is not beautiful or nice. In fact, I'm not even all that nice. But my mind is worth respect, if only because it exists."

The birds were chirping as the sun sank lower and lower to the west. It was turning slightly reddish and Anna knew she would enjoy the walk back, being able to admire the view through the trees. The area where they sat was pleasantly quiet. John seemed calmer, she concluded, but she did studiously stare at him when she knew he wasn't looking.

_A bit creepy Anna._

But she did it out of care.

"So it is part of what you are?" Is it why others see you as...well, different?"

Johns face contorted with a false smile. Anna could not observe it, but he was near tears. He knew he wouldn't cry and that he had not reached a climax of upset but rather a quick surge of emotion as he spoke about himself. Anna's minefield of tip-toeing in that last sentence did bother him, but he answered all the same rather than malignantly linger on it.

"Yes, I think it might be. Something I have gotten used to. In fact the only reason I write is because I think it might make me more empathetic. Oh, by the way, another trait some of us have is to speak for long periods, as I have done and am doing now." He said those last words with an obvious self-awareness.

"Did I bore you?"

_What. What gave him that impression?_

She thought back to what she had done or said, but realised with a sense of newness in knowledge that what had in fact happened was that he was asking sincerely. Just as he had asked bluntly yesterday.

"Don't worry, you didn't bore me and I'm actually happy you felt you could tell me about your thing."

John was happier, hearing that. He must have been enjoying Anna's company, because he did not feel as tense around her as he normally did around other people. Why this was the way it was, he couldn't say.

Anna meanwhile, was a bit overloaded herself, not with the world but what John had been saying. She resolved to look up about Autism when she got back.

"I'm glad to have helped." John said. In the next moment, he lay back on the grass and looked almost sleepy. His monologue had taken a lot of power from his body. He would need to rest a few moments. Anna got the hint and decided to wait until he was ready. She thought it only fair that she say a bit about herself. She had not expected the length of the reply John gave, or that he would speak to her so stubbornly. He seemed out of breath and on a closer look she saw he was quite at rest, though not quite asleep. She wondered if it was an autistic trait. She was careful, however, not to start seeing it everywhere in the days after.

In the end he rose suddenly and asked Anna about herself.

She told him what bits she had missed on the way. About her friends, about how she and Elsa got on. About her Mother, Ida. She avoided mentions of her currently near-invalid state of existence. She thought she should not tell him too much about what she was.

She was indeed defensive, but even she had to admit she liked John a little more than when she first met him. Then, something puzzled her. He and Elsa. If he was so fascinated by her, why was he sitting her, right now, with Anna? She felt stupid not to ask but slightly foolish if she did. Nonetheless, she asked him and his face took on awareness of himself and her that it hadn't before.

"You spoke to me first. I believed you would have wanted to talk to me and 'clear' things up, no?"

Anna was surprised to find he was right. He had hit the nail on its head and probably split it in two. She confirmed this and saw he was not hurt by it. Just curious.

"Anna, I promise I mean Elsa only the greatest respect."

The sun was eventually nearly gone and after some talking they each decided to head back along the railway. Anna came away curious about Autism and about John himself, while John came away feeling better for being able to speak about that which defined him.

Halfway along the corrugated steel Anna pointed to a very far off building forked by fields and clearly difficult to get to. It was white-walled. John liked its isolation and wished as much for his own house, which sadly had neighbours he despised.

Anna told him that was Elsa's house and that she and Anna used to meet during the nights on this very railway. John was fascinated to be in some way actually physically present near Elsa, though he knew he must be up to a kilometre away, possibly less. He recalled that Anna had said Elsa often stayed indoors.

He mentally noted it and then they continued, departing from each other with a handshake and uncertain smile.

They had each learned a good deal in the last few hours, and had both concluded what the next sane action should be to take:

_I need to speak to Elsa._

**Authors commentary:**

**Wow, I just kept adding to this one. My rule of "Minimum 1000 words a chapter" seems small right now. I have written this chapter over a 3 hour period. I wrote some character diaries as well and those alone could probably get their own chapter (though I plan to spread them out and adjust them with time) given how much I've written pf them. **

**Authors Notes:**

**Given how much I had to edit this one down, the next chapter should hopefully be swift in coming out. I hope you can look forward ****to it. These chapters are getting quite long now. Might have a few short ones, im unsure yet.**

**I will update when I can. Give me feedback if you can. Thank you.**


	9. Chapter 9

Morning Routine. Elsa had not had one for some time.

Elsa's restless night wanderings had left her tired constantly. Sleep therapists and the like recommended a decrease in activity with each day, but her Mum was always stressing about things besides that. Family, relatives, life. It all made for little time for Elsa. Plus Elsa generally was alone most of the time.

This morning was typical. Overcast with the sun not quite able to be pin-pointed. Elsa lived in the country. The railway to the east served as a useful nature wander. But she seldom took them. She walked to school, due to their mad policy about being physically fit. It extended well into their own lives. Elsa followed suite partly because she believed others did. Hence why she walked. She also took them because they were a source of clarity.

Walking was calm, predictable and could be planned. She liked it. She just hated being tired.

As she thought all of this, she looked at the used pages from the night before. The notebook or diary or whatever she was using it as had served a purpose. It had provided a drive. And it came as an idea from someone she met only once. Not a bad start.

She woke and, still stupored from sleep, re-read what she had wrote the night before.

It was a short, if frantic and precise biography. Elsa decided that the reason she had put off writing before now was due to the size of establishing things. It took a lot of time and thought. She was amazed she had made it through the night. Her left hand was still sore from the writing cramp. She had started with superfluous and boring details of the day, May 6th and then started writing after her dinner. The pen was mercifully enduring.

_My name is Elsa. Last name Antonia. I am not very good at this but I will try it._

_Today, I woke up around noon and did next to nothing. Played the playstation for a while, then I went and tried to finish my chess game I started...some time ago. Still got nothing. Then I started reading the Harry Potter Book Mum let me borrow._

_Hang on, I have dinner._

Elsa had returned and considered herself suddenly. For a second it seemed that history had come to her. Her history. Her story was told, but only by certain people. Fallible, jealous, selfish, stupid people. She imagined all people, herself included, were like this. Fallible. Yes. Fallible most of all. But they were each one to different degrees.

And so you never knew a person until you could hear their voice or its equivalent.

She had decided to write about herself, but not in the now. In the past. What led her to this point.

How long it would take, she chose not to think about. The more she thought about her past, the more she liked the idea. She had to be recorded somewhere. She picked up the pen unceremoniously, rubbed her arms and tried to ignore her wish to unclothe herself more. Her skin was feeling very uncomfortable in this cotton. But her hands were fine.

She began:

_I was born on December 21__st__, the shortest day of the year and winter solstice. I was born in 1996. My parents named me after a character. My Mum has told me it was the name of someone she once knew. I always liked Dad's explanation: That I was named after the villainess from "The Last Crusade". I have never seen it._

_My Mums name is Edina and my Dads name is Arthur, but everyone just calls him King. It comes from a nickname he had as a child. Most children call their parents by their titles but for me, it is only sometimes. Dad just is 'King' to me and to everyone else. Mum was always mum._

_Edina met King back in the early 90's. Having me wasn't a part of the plan but it's what happened. I was lucky to be born, from what they have said. There was a storm of snow the night Mum was in labour. King was scared out of his wits. I was born just after the midnight clock struck. The Doctor told Mum "She has ten fingers, ten toes and is just fine."_

_We used to live in the city. I don't remember much of it. I remember stealing someone's toy and then they came back to get it, I punched them before they could speak. They were shouting, but I didn't understand any of it, I was just scared. I can't even remember why I stole it. It was a red haired doll, of a woman in a dress._

_I often feel sad when I think of my life, mostly because of its challenges. I have fallen out with so many people. I don't remember much about the first nursery I went to either. I remember I cried when it rained. Every time. Then came a week where it rained all the time, always after I went inside the nursery. The woman there didn't like me, telling my mum I made her shiver. She is the first adult I came across who thought this of me. Others would follow._

_King wanted to move. He hated cities. He had gone to live in Paris in his younger years just to get away from home. When we did move to Arndell when I was 4, I agreed with him. There was silence at last! I could think. I could walk in fields and sit on top of hay bales. I COULD WATCH THE STARS! Oh my god how I loved it. I still do. Arndell. It was nice. A village of about 500 people or thereabouts. A typical village. I stayed in my room a lot though. That's a habit I haven't lost._

_When we first moved, I hadn't started school yet. I can't remember exactly when we settled in to Arndell, but it must have been summer because I well remember that at exactly 8 o clock the sun was still out. Back then I took pride in telling the time. I was bright for my age, I've been told. But I was always told to be modest and to never flaunt my apparent intelligence. I don't know why, but I am terrible at taking credit or being told I did something well. Mum said it was good manners and I've followed her instruction. I remember I spoke to King one night about it years later and he said I should just take as much credit as I'm due and bask in my intelligence. He was always quiet, generally. Mum said he was "Orwell without the books." I don't know who he is, but mum said King was much like him._

_Sorry, I keep going off track. Just like in speech. _

_As I was saying/writing, I remember it was in summer. Mum and King went to barbecues. I wasn't much a fan of them. I was often encouraged to play with other children after mum saw me listening to the adults conversations. They were always so much more interesting. But she told me to play with the other kids my age. I went up to one boy and I thought I asked him what we were doing but next I knew my face was drowned with water. I cried. I didn't know why he did that. I still don't. What was the need? I remember his face took on that horrifying look of someone who felt superior. I couldn't do much. _

_Then, there was shouting among the other kids and more water was being fired from water guns. In the end, they all came after me. I cried more. I ran out the garden to the dirt road around at the back of the house. It hurt a lot, but I was too upset to care. I could hear them getting further away so I stopped. Then I felt a sharp pain on the back of my ear. They were throwing stones. I couldn't throw and I could tell the adults didn't know what was happening, I was alone. One or two girls tried to persuade the others, who were obviously boys, to stop. I just stood there, feeling the stones. And I thought of what I could do. I was finally able to remember why I was standing there once I took the moment to think._

_And I was so angry. I ran at the principle boy, whose name I later learned was Nathaniel, and I hit him in his face as hard as I could. I was crying again but the tears did not weaken me, they showed resolve. I hit him, knocking him down. I did not care that I could feel the others trying to hit me._

_I was going to kill him. I was. I may have been four and a little girl, but I could hurt people. Because I didn't understand what I had done wrong, or what I was supposed to do and people understood violence more than words. This fact did and does upset me. I hope it is something that only children do, but King said it wasn't often like that and that adults could be just as bad._

_Doused in rage I put my hands around his throat and held on as hard as I could. I stopped and then I hit him in the face. I don't remember if he fought back, or really much of anything. He was hurt, though. He was bleeding from one of his eyes. Then I great amount of noise came from the garden and suddenly I knew I was in trouble. I was about to cry again when one of the two girls came up to me. _

_She asked me if I was ok and spoke back when one of the boys called me 'crazy'._

_I still remember what the girl said: "No, YOU ARE. You throw stones at her and hurt her? You get what you deserve. What has she done!?"_

_She turned to me and said "Whats your name?"_

"_Elsa", I replied._

_The girl and I ended up at her house. In her room, to be exact. She and I hadn't met until now. She was also four. She spoke to her mum and I didn't get into trouble. I don't know how that happened. I thought I had gotten caught. _

_I was hyperventilating after all the crying and the girl spoke to me soothingly. I was led away with some care and I took a moment. I noticed the immense pain in my hands from hitting the boy and I could feel sharp pain just behind my hairline. I was bleeding there. But I didn't mention it. I dislike others taking trouble for me. And yet..._

_We were in her room for a few hours. She shared it with her sister who she never or rarely saw._

_This girl was the girl who would become my best friend: Anna Carney. She was so nice to me. We played on her Playstation One for some time and I started to feel better. My hands hurt, cut and bleeding but Anna was being so kind to me, I didn't want to bother her with it. Even when they started to sting._

_She spoke so protectively and I felt almost compelled to trust her. Her face was so likeable to me and her name was like mine. It had four letters and sounded quite similar to me. Then we went outside. Well, I stood on the stone doorstep. The garden was next to the one with the barbecue in it. At that time, I didn't know where it was yet._

"_It's ok. My mum and your mum are talking now. It's ok."_

_But I was still standing there like an oaf. I didn't know what to do. When it started to rain I was stressed, but not scared. The girl called Anna walked up to me, smiling._

"_Do you not like rain?" I nodded. "It's ok. It won't hurt you."_

_I knew she was right but I felt almost too pathetic to tell her the real reason. I only did it because I felt she deserved the answer. She had done so little and yet so much for me and it had barely been any time at all. But it seemed long to me back then. _

"_It's the sound." I said. _

"_Oh." She replied. She looked lost for a moment and I was worried but then she outstretched her hand. This gesture stuck with me. She did it so slowly and so carefully. She was trying to be considerate. I realise now that this was very mature for someone who is only four. And she is actually younger than me._

_I didn't like being touched most places. My head I could handle being petted by my parents but that was it. My arms always felt so fragile and weak. They still feel that way now. I don't know why but no one else seems to feel them that way. Their bodies are free from that unpleasant sensitiveness. I envy that. How can they be so unaware of them?_

_But Anna held out her hand and looked at me with promise. I swallowed my soul and took her hand. And then, barefoot by now, I strolled carefully from the doorstep into the rain. And I could feel Anna's nails and her hand and how clammy it was. But then I held it tighter and walked more measurably. I could feel her heart beat. It might have been mine but I choose to think it was hers. I felt safer and for the first time in my life I felt calm. Calmer than I had ever felt. And I was happy. Anna was a stranger and had never met me. But she stood up for me when it counted. She has since told me that she and her parents, not to mention her friends, 'fell out' with her after that for a while. But she has said that it wasn't really that, but it was the best way to put it for me. That last sentence I have heard my whole life._

_Anna defended me and tried to understand me. But I am beginning to think that no one understands me. My parents have the best idea but they misunderstand certain dislikes for weaknesses, like my issue with certain clothes. Anna is the only person my age I like. She has been for 8 years now. Meeting her has brought me good things and I think if I had not met her, I might have been truly alone._

_If I had not met her, I might have started a diary much sooner._

Elsa had an uncomfortable thought.

_So why have I started one now?_

_Had I not met Anna, I may have not started one and just stayed closed off. But I am closed off anyway. Anna is just the exception. But she is the most important person I have ever met so far. I would die for her, I think. _

_I know I have never had to prove this and this means I actually hope it can happen. If I could save her and repay the favour, I would feel so much better about our friendship. When I meet her I get quite shy. Not totally but enough that she notices. With her I can always tell. I feel sometimes that I have no right to speak to her. I don't think she gains anything from talking to me. Especially recently._

_But when I bring it up she says we are still close, I just overthink it. _

_I owe Anna a great deal of myself. I have had troubles with my distorted brain my whole life. And now Anna is having trouble with hers. She is so sad and seems so lost. She tells me about it when I stay at hers for a long time. I owe her a debt. And if there is a god or guiding providence, I will repay it. She stood by me when she stood to gain nothing. I will now stand by her as she works through this sadness._

She looked outside the window for the first time and it was dark. She didn't want to check the clock. She had mentally driven herself away from awareness of the outer things such as that. She liked it and she was less stressed. She didn't look at the clock or feel bothered by the time. She cast off her awful cardigan and got into her pyjamas. She felt instantly better and forced herself to stretch, being very very tired.

And, in another first, she looked forward to the sleep.

_Sleep is freedom from deep thought. It sounds nice. I might go willingly for once._

Elsa lay down and almost instantly felt her eyes closing. She owed someone else much less for giving her the notebook.

John.

The next morning, as she walked past Anna's street on the way to school, she spied her at her window. Elsa just smiled. Anna waved back. Elsa felt more complete today. She had written about her past. About Anna.

What was ahead?

**Authors Commentary:**

**This one took a while to get going but once I did, I wrote it quickly. This has been my favourite to write thus far.**

**Authors notes:**

**Things may be picking up soon. I'm unsure. I hope you still feel like reading me, followers. My long absence wasn't great and I apologise for it. Review if you can. **

**I will update when I can.**


	10. Chapter 10

"A pleasure, to see you again." He said, smiling as he sat down.

There was quite a long pause. Elsa looked at John, expecting him to be impatient. But he wasn't. He sat still, motionless, possibly thinking. It always took Elsa a little while to reply to people in person.

"Hello again, John."

They sat opposite each other. The school year was fast towards concluding and they were all to be drafted into high school. Elsa was not giving it much thought. She was truly scared. Primary school hadn't made her very trustworthy of others her age. High school, people were older. The work itself she wasn't thinking about.

John was much the same, but he saw himself as being able to stay out of trouble if he could. How interesting to him that he should even expect trouble.

"How was your weekend?" he asked. Elsa did not wish to bore him. But not wanting to be impolite. "You would find most of it boring."

Conversation. They each had their own parchments for it. John was flexible, but cautious. He would say hello, compliment you on your hair, say he was fine and try to get out if he could. He rationalised himself by considering that he didn't exist to entertain others. He lived for conversation he found interesting, but most other people had no need for the same ambitions.

Elsa memorised what others said. She was silent most of the time and rarely ever spoke. She could talk to Anna, to Mother and some others, but not often. She was more afraid of what conversations could lead to than anything. But what really got to her was how exhausting it could be. Breathing properly, speaking at the right pace, speaking loudly, clearly and listening to the other person or persons, she struggled to keep up. How others did it, she was sure she was unaware. Unlike John, it never occurred to her that she might want other people to find her interesting.

The only sure way to get her to talk, she thought, was honesty and an absence of pretence. She couldn't make herself talk if she wanted to, but honest people, people who spoke fearlessly and weren't afraid to talk about themselves in lights other than good ones; they were people she wanted to hear from when she could be bothered.

The colour and wavelengths of light people viewed themselves through, from bright and warm lights to dark and flickering ones, Elsa was only sure that she saw herself without a rose tint. She thought that John saw himself in some strange yellow light. She assumed, without really wondering why, that he was more full of himself than he liked to say.

The notebook, the way he spoke, he seemed terribly self aware. What Elsa did not yet know was that Anna had met him and decided he was compensating for something. The past clung tightly to his heels and no matter how hot they got from whatever was chasing him, he stood still. Elsa was thinking all of this slowly and she came back to earth to see John writing in his notebook. She had forgotten where they had been. She was frustrated.

"Uh. I'm sorry I...I daydreamed."

He replied with a sheepish smile. "It's quite alright."

"What did you do on the weekend?"

John thought about it. He collected the events.

"Well, I went and spent time with my friend Kristoff. Then I did things like stargazing."

He was boring himself.

"Did you do anything fun?"

"How do you mean?"

"Did you do anything that was worth talking about?"

He thought. He had been thinking a good deal about music. Music made him move around and his brain felt like it was actually walking when he heard it.

"Well, I think I have discovered something about music on MP3's and the brain."

Elsa never found interest in recorded music. She knew pieces to play for the Violin and a select few songs that got to her in some way she couldn't understand, but she was intensely unwelcoming to new sounds.

"And what have you discovered?" If she could understand it, she would have deployed sarcasm on the last word.

"I think that when you feel like moving to music, it's a good sign. I think it can actually help people." And on he went.

Elsa's boredom was being held back by her compulsive need to be nice. She thought she had to tell John something, but having the skinny dolt in front of her made her feel no compulsions. She felt nothing was to be said.

She hated this feeling. She didn't feel so bad on his part. There were people like him all over. She had met people 'like her' before but they were almost always frauds.

All that history, the past. Things worth writing the night before...all of it seemed gone. Rushed like a snuffed flame from wounded ash.

She felt bad because there was not anguish, which would have made her confide, nor joy or companionship, which would have made her respond, even half-heartedly. But he had one thing about him he had mentioned thus far: Music.

A thought, a pause, a look.

"John, I want you to do something for me. With music."

_Am I testing him? Do I test people? Well, I don't have a lab so..._

And John was also infused with a sense of manic attention above anything, but Elsa only noticed his cheeks seemed tauter.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean I want you to do something with me in mind involving music."

He paused and then realised she had taken him at face value and smirked. It was like a confirmation.

"Yes of course. What would you like me to do exactly?"

Elsa was showing up blank.

"I don't know, John. Sorry. Something absorbing" She said flatly.

He had already decided he wanted her to hear a song he had loved for years.

Or he had, until she gave him a different suggestion.

"Music that is challenging to hear."

He smiled once more.

"I have just the thing. Don't suppose you can meet me after school? Visit my house? I promise it is not far."

"I can. Where is your house?"

He gave her an in-depth serious of instructions as to where it was. He thought about asking why she needed to ask but quickly discounted it. Constant need for justifications of the boring stuff would just make him boring.

He was internally ecstatic.

_But before fun and potential friendship- Tedium._

And the school provided tedium.

_**After School**_

Counting shadows. The clouds were moving quickly and stroked the atmosphere. A carpet would show itself on the ground and scuttle away, smoothly, easily. John saw it as similar to a loading bar. Elsa experienced it more vividly. She had to stop walking every few seconds because when the sun went away for a moment, she could feel it leave. She found it akin to the sensation one has when one forgets to breathe in having stared at something for slightly too long.

The contrast came though and as the sun came back, she imagined a breath of air filling her lungs and dividing until it reached the blood. Fuel for thought.

She was so lost she almost failed to notice the house, with its stone steps, grass flanking it and pebble paths on each side. The door was a very vivid green, like hers, but its style was different. Everything seemed untouched. The walls were of stone but on the inside, it had been more comfortably furnished. The smell was one of intense disparity. She imagined a rose red like blood oozing with smell. It was a warm smell but it was unstable and seemed to change depending on where you stood. Other less interesting smells were permeating and Elsa was getting too lost in them for her own liking. The intense sunlight, the extremes of everything around them, just by the front door.

They stood inside the door and removed their outer clothes, of which she had none. No need for coats or jackets in this weather. She wore her school uniform, which she found comfortable enough.

They were now approaching his room. It was cool in the house. There were little bits and pieces every it could be placed. Tables with things on them. John mentioned his Mother had a love for small cow trinkets. Elsa found it strange, but she herself had collected stranger things, she realised. Geologic stones. Different styles of theatre tape. Oddly shaped stones. Walking sticks from times at beaches and in the woods. A coin, of different values, one for each year since 1971. Petals from different flowers.

Then, at her mentioning, Johns Mother, a blonde haired woman with a very young face for her age, appeared.

"Hi Son."

"Hi Mum. That's me in. And this is Elsa Antonia."

His Mother stood taken aback for a moment as the girl turned the corner. But the woman cracked open a smile and frothed friendliness.

"Hello there Elsa, nice to meet you!" The Woman chorused.

"You know each other from School?" She asked with rhetorically.

Elsa, not quite ready to look at the woman, replied truthfully.

"Yes. We met in school and started speaking last week."

There was a pause of unknown origin, so Elsa continued.

"He started speaking to me on Friday. He came up and spoke to me and also gave me a blue notebook..."

Elsa had not seen it but Johns Mother gave him a look of what he guessed was derision, but she kept it sly. He thought harshly that Elsa would not have noticed anyway. His mood was getting not just bad, but angry. At his Mothers sudden appearance. Childhood. What a time.

_Let's hope the teenage years serve me better._

"Well, I'm glad to see you are making friends, John."

He mimed his door open and exaggeratedly gestured to Elsa to come in. He did this to get away from his Mum as much as for Elsas benefit. Neither intention wasted, she stepped inside and he closed the door without a third thought.

John's room was smaller than Elsa's. She thought it was appropriate, as John seemed to live a great deal of his life in his head. The room was clearly well lived in. There was a chair, a computer and desk. The desk had stains from ink, what seemed to be paint, possible chalk and what she hoped was food.

A globe sat near the window, which was letting in the resplendency of the sun. There were books on it, one turned up right, the others neatly arranged next to each other. One red cover, then yellow, green and blue, in such an order it had to be intentional.

The bed was well kept and the pillows erect and fluffed. His cupboard was cluttered in extremis, but neat, like everything else she could see, with the exception of the desk. The cupboard faced towards the bed, which itself was laid out from the window, pillow window side. The desk was next to the cupboard, tan coloured. It was packed with paper, pens, other writing utensils, post it notes and a mirror with a cloth over it, defeating its purpose, she thought.

She smelled something interesting. She guessed it was incense, or something similar. He had a bedside cabinet and on it sat three objects which for Elsa seemed strange things to put there, as they were easy to reach but she seldom thought them in need of such ease of access.

One was a picture of a girl. A small picture, the girl looked about John's age now, but the photo looked older by what must have been a year or two. It was facing openly at an angle that made it visible to most of the room. There was a touch of dust upon it.

Another was a small, circular glass. After a moment she thought it was a shot glass. It looked very ornate and beautiful. It had some kind of purple bottom and it stood with another object beside. It looked brand new.

The final object was an ovular pendant. It had little teeth, in Elsa's view, which curved on top of one another, over and over into a circle. On the top, each leaf-like section had a metal colour in it. The colours made a rainbow of what must have been 10 to 15 shades. It started at red, moved towards Violet and then faded back into red. There was something new and old about it, global but personal too. It seemed a symbol to her. But she was not sure what of.

The walls were coloured white. It had been purple before, which she could tell from the flames of it at the very edges of the walls.

In summary, the room was well lived in with many things to accommodate. Everything looked organised and ordered except his desk. It was not chaotic, but slightly dirty and seemed to be where John was most. There was practically no dust except a faint trace of it around his bedside cabinet and the objects therein. All other things seemed to be placed and used in a precise way that Elsa could not help but admire. This place would have been immensely satisfying for her to view, more than it already was, but the rooms very raison d'être seemed tarnished by its small but interesting occlusions to this organisational rule. The Desk and the Cabinet.

"Why did you paint the walls white?" she said with a sense of curiosity towards him.

"Well observed. I realised that white walls reflect light more and promoted clear thinking to my brain. I get fewer headaches at night, but more in the daytime." He explained.

She was staring contentedly out the window.

"It's a good room. I like the colour of the walls and the bed." She muttered sheepishly. She was trapped in that awful swamp of not knowing what to say which, with John, she took slightly more seriously.

He didn't seem too annoyed. He sat on his chair and moved towards his desk, spinning to face her.

"Elsa, don't stand on formality here. If you don't feel like talking you don't need to. It's rare I get visitors so I like to show off a little a bit. All the effort I put in for my own piece of mind. It's nice to see it appreciated."

"I think I know what you mean. You keep order because if you don't you feel like you can't keep up with everything. But the price of keeping order is that you are the only who bothers keeping up."

John turned to his computer. "Something like that."

He spent the next 5 minutes starting it up. It was a big, heavy and dull thing that Elsa had not often come across. She stood still in front of the by now closed door behind her, facing his bed and the window. She wasn't just taking it in. She didn't want to trespass on anything of Johns. Manners kept were never lost.

He turned to find her still standing there, the sun was right above her eyes and in her hair.

"Elsa, you can sit down if you like."

"Where?" she asked pre-cociously .

"The bed, the floor. I have a spare chair but it doesn't spin like mine." He span in the thing, grinning foolishly. She didn't find it funny at first, but found his grin made her and she breathed in, chortling for a second. John was surprised.

"Can I please sit in the spare chair?"

"Of course. It's over there, to your right." He pointed to it and then turned back to the computer screen. She expected him to get it for her, not wanting to trespass. But he seemed non-acting. So she reluctantly went over and got the wooden chair. It, like almost everything else, was very sleek and clean. She pulled it up and sat next to him, slightly behind him.

"Ok, I have several songs you might like. Do you like lyrics, instrumentals, a mix of the two?"

Elsa thought for a long moment. He didn't look at her but John was momentarily fascinated by her thinking. She would go quiet and take her time. Yes, he noticed it more now. She did it whenever he asked her something challenging or, admittedly, strange. He didn't think it was a sign of patience however, rather a sign of just being careful.

"Instruments are what I know. Some lyrics are good but most aren't. I find them distracting to hear usually. But please, do try them."

John nodded with her answers, seeming engaged, partly to hide his own feeling of distance from her, something he did not like. He felt very unaccommodating and even forceful in his idea to bring her along. He was desperately hopeful that she wasn't uncomfortable. It may have been her idea but still.

"Well, I have these headphones, untouched and unused, because you said you like to be absorbed in music?"

"Yes. I do."

"Ok, three songs. Ill adjust the volume until you give me a thumbs up. If you don't like it, just take them off. Ok?"

Elsa nodded. "I understand." She thought for a moment as she put the things on.

"Let's see what you have for me, Mr Hardy."

John smiled. "Let's"

The first sounds were of drums. They were intense and sudden and reverberated quite loudly. John as turning down the volume and trying indicate with his hands how much she liked its intensity. She gave thumbs down and was slightly displeased to find the music had stopped, but she was still feeling indifferent to her manners and said nothing.

"That was "I don't care anymore" By Phil Collins. Have you heard of him?"

She shook her head non-committal.

"Ok, Elsa Antonia, try this one."

Play he pressed.

Elsa could hear a very strange, very high sound. It was vaguely 8-bit, but this did not satisfy her. No, she could see, in her mind's eye, a great many lights suddenly. They were on a palette. She found it intense and closed her eyes to see it better. It was consistent but random all at once. The background was like a white light, opaque and a very orange sunlight crept around it. The lights were like stationary fireworks. They worked with the rhythm well and Elsa could not quite move to it but the feeling in her mind was of intense pleasure and hyperactive imagination.

Then the guitar riff came in.

The lights of many hues were suddenly a flash and then faded back into their random, ever changing pattern with the other, less identifiable sound that she was enjoying much more.

_Duun. Dun-dun...Duun. Dun-dun..._

The rhythm began to make more sense as the guitar made its routine apparent. A quick succession of drums and then it all streamlined. She was unsure where she was but she was _fascinated _by the effect the music was having on her imagination. It was so intense and immediate, she got lost in it in a way she could only compare to the way she felt when she lay in the field in that lonely morning.

It kept going and she was getting content with it. The 8 bit, or at least, digital sound was going through an ever changing pitch. She found the way it materialised like gentle, tiny flies with huge luminescent lights on their backs. They were being seen from afar.

"OUT HERE IN THE FIELD."

She was startled by the lyric but liked what was said. She didn't understand the next one but she was too distracted now and waved to John and opened her eyes.

The music died away. Elsa was not as glad of it as she thought after a moment to adjust back to the room.

"So, what did you think of that one? You certainly listened for longer."

"It was...I'm not sure. I liked it. Loved it, in fact, at first but I just got distracted by the lyric. But the music...oh my god. Very few songs make me feel like that."

"I'm glad it was so engaging. You had your eyes closed and you seemed a lot calmer."

John was not exaggerating. From his Point of View, Elsa sinked into the song quickly and was quite empty of everything around her. Everything was going on behind those eyes. He knew that, and he knew little about people.

"I felt a bit lost, but in a pleasant way. I don't like being lost but I like the idea of being somewhere totally isolated or looked over and seeing things in it. And that song, musical piece, whatever it was, got me lost in those thoughts. I didn't know I could still do that."

"So this has happened to you before."

"Yes. I was a little younger. It was in the car. The song was "Crazy". I loved the music behind it."

John didn't try remembering what the song was.

"I can't recall that song."

"Oh well." Her eyes looked at him for the first time since she sat down. She didn't often realise quite how he looked. His eyes were a shade of brown that, as shades of such colours went, were unimpressive in his own mind. But his face seemed thick with thoughts trying to come forth but being lost somewhere along the way. She imagined his neurons contained many a dead messenger.

His hands were placed in a reptilian way over the keyboard. Everything about him looked evasively tired. He noticed her looking at him.

"You ok? You're staring off again."

_Not staring, John, looking. Observing._

"Sorry. I'm fine. What was that song called?"

John turned back to the computer. "It was a song called 'Baba o'riley' by "The Who".

_I've never heard of them before._

"Well, I liked how it started."

John felt a little better but uncomfortable with the way the day was turning out. He didn't like how pleased with himself he was getting with this 'development'. He almost felt like he couldn't think that thought. Assumptions. He was too prone to making them but hated himself for make them too.

"If you want, I could make a mix of that song for you to listen to. Cut out the annoying parts?"

Elsa thought for two minutes while John shut down the music player. He didn't want to ruin her mood by playing something else right now. He still thought that was over thinking things, but he was feeling resigned.

"No John. It's fine. You don't have to. I enjoyed it; I don't want to make you do anything you don't want to do."

"Elsa Antonia...I don't see making it as a penance or chore. I want to be your friend. I want you to know I'm not 'out to get you'. And yeah, I'm aware lots of boys and some girls are total inconsiderates who only think for themselves. I don't want to seem 'special' by not doing that. I just wish to be friendly."

_What the hell do I mean?_

"I know John. And today has been fantastic. Really, it has been interesting. I wasn't bored. Do you hate being bored?"

John didn't even have to think before answering.

"More than anything. Misery is better than boredom. Pain can motivate one out of it and tragedy is never boring, even when it's self inflicted."

Elsa experienced a new found geniality with this sentiment.

"Boredom is my enemy too. The enemy of my enemy...is my friend."

John exhaled and moved his head down and up again.

"That was well put. Nice."

"So John, we are to be friends. I'm satisfied that you aren't annoying, violent, dangerous or anything except a bit weird. Sorry to put it like that."

"That's fine. My family have said worse. Yes Elsa. We can be friends. We will, by being so, Improve each other, maybe. I can help you to not apologise so much. I know it isn't your fault. It's always girls that do it. Makes me sad."

"Well, I know what you mean. I hope I can motivate you to open up perhaps.?It's quite clear you actually keep a lot of things in and I don't think it helps you."

"Same with you." He retorted, out of defence.

Elsa stood up and stretched her legs.

"So, we both admit we are flawed in the way we handle our own emotions, then?" She was still unsure about asserting any uniting truth with him, even now. Overstepping the mark was not an ideal thought to her.

"Yeah, let's go with that. Keep things simple."

She smiled. He did too. She walked towards the door with him following behind. Each played their role well in the exit. Following scripts, like everything in their lives, avoiding confrontation, terrified of making conversation, isolated from others, keeping prepared phrases and locking away the truth when it simmered in their minds. Not just because they didn't understand the world in which we loved, but because that world wasn't being much help to them. But encounters like this. They were worthwhile. And they helped.

"You are not alone, Elsa Antonia."

"John, since we spoke, I found myself hoping that sentence can be true. I offer you the same. Please, try to relax a bit. I can't read faces anymore than I can understand hieroglyphs but even I can tell you are much stressed. Sleep. Have a kit kat."

She walked away . She didn't like how she ended things though and as she reached the door, she wanted to make it clear to him she was being serious.

"There this quote I know. I can't think what it's from but I hope it makes more sense to you that it did to me."

John was intrigued and brightened up a bit.

"Lets see..." He prompted.

"Every villain is a hero in their own mind. The good people wonder far too much if they are really villains."

John was taken aback at this. For him, it meant a great deal to hear those two sentences.

"Who told you it?"

"My dad, King."

He stood dumb for a minute. Then he said a quick goodbye.

"I'll see you here again, Elsa Antonia."

And shut the door.

_Well, King is right. Which does that make me?_

**Authors Commentary:**

**I've been busy with work since college finished. It's exhausting physically so I haven't been able to get into the mindset to write, but I had a lot of the details for this scene thought out in advance and I apologise for the delay. I enjoyed writing this scene very much and yeah, these two characters are my favourite to write. **

**10 Chapters!**

**Authors notes:**

**Longest chapter of any story yet on any of my fics, I believe. This story will continue to be written and I intend to finish it, but not for some time. There are still many chapters ahead. This fic will get longer because I feel I have a lot to say. I'll touch on the autism stuff soon. **


	11. Chapter 11

**Friday evening, the present.**

Anna hated every moment she was spending here. Birthdays had once been her favourite time. But not so much now. All her friends were there. There was going to be a dinner. Ida said it was a double celebration. Anna's brother had passed his driving test as well as had a birthday. She congratulated him and put on a brave face. Everyone wanted to say hi to Anna but at times, she sometimes wished she had never been the social type in her past.

Because now it was expected of her.

There were aunts, uncles, family friends. The village of Arndell was a small space. The Carney family were amongst the most well known. Anna couldn't say why, but she had been used to it. One of those annoying legacies one was drafted into, fresh from the womb eyes still twinkling to candles.

They were all seated in the eating area. The restaurant was not overly fancy, but homely. It reminded Anna of her trip to the highlands years back. Antique things, wooden furniture. The table was frightfully cold and Anna leaned on it all the same. She was too tired for all of this. Too scared. It was cruel, to ask someone to go through this. She was not overwhelmed like Elsa sometimes was.

Rather, she was anxious. Anxious that she would piss someone off or say nothing. This arresting paralysis of thought was doing her no favours. She wanted to go back into her room. Back to comfort.

When Ida had come up to tell her the dinner out was occurring, Anna said nothing. She wanted to lock her door, to remove herself from the world so she wouldn't commit its mistakes.

That was what she hated about herself. She was frozen in terror at almost all times these days.

But over what, she had no idea.

Months before, things were the same as now, but one thing was missing. Elsa.

She was missing Elsa tonight.

**February Past**

It had been a school trip. The snows of winter had just melted. She remembered watching Elsa stare wide-eyed out the window at the melting snow. They were sitting next to each other.

"That's the amazing thing Anna: It's all just water. Nothing else."

"Yeah, it is pretty amazing you can get that from just water."

The trip was slow but in the end they reached the long awaited destination of the middle of nowhere. They were to go on a nature walk and photograph a certain style of plant. Anna was only more anxious when she saw that they had to go in groups.

She loved hanging out with Elsa and they agreed to go as a duo into a marshy area. She felt awful. She did it so Elsa wouldn't feel left out.

She quickly decided not to dwell on it. Why dwell on one of your better friendships, she thought.

They had wellingtons on with ill fitting jackets and all the time Elsa complained about how it felt.

"Just pull through this Elsa; we don't want your mum to get mad at you for leaving clothes again."Elsa looked into the distance.

"I'll do my best, Anna." She nodded, more for herself than Anna.

Elsa stridently stood up first and stood solidly waiting for Anna to rise herself. Elsa was looking at her. Really looking at her.

Something was off, she felt. But the older girl paid no mind. Elsa had very staring eyes that could seem almost dead. It was what lay beyond them that made her useful.

The teacher escorted the children off the bus and spoke.

"Ok, children. This whole field and the woods here are safe to travel along. Now, go in groups of two, behave yourselves and be back here by 5 o clock before it gets dark."

Elsa was reasonably motivated despite her feet feeling awful and a problem to sort out in her mind. They both liked some solitude and they rarely got to have it with each other. The pair waited a few minutes before moving, so they could avoid everyone else.

Elsa stood thinking. Anna stood dreading.

"Will we go to the woods?" Asked Elsa.

"It's up to you, Elsa."

Elsa dropped her head down for a split second.

"Oh, don't go doing that. You know I am not good with decisions like that."

Anna wasn't in a mood to doddle.

"Woods."

Elsa started striding ahead and Anna dragged herself just behind her.

"I have no idea what we are looking for."

"Don't worry Anna, I do. Plus, there's still some snow here! I'm going to collect some and see if I can take it home. I want to watch it dry."

Anna gave a false smile. "I admire your enthusiasm. Is snow your obsession thing right now?"

"Yes, it is one of them. I have little mini-ones sometimes. I'm sorry if I am boring you."

"You aren't boring me Elsa."

The red-head yawned. She didn't want to think about the true answer.

"I don't know how anyone could function on the amount of sleep I do."

"I wasn't sure if it's something you are supposed to point out but...but you have bags under your eyes and I could see you dozing on the bus. I wasn't sure what to do so I just didn't say anything."

"Thanks Elsa. I needed that nap."

Elsa was so thoughtful. In fact she was very thoughtful. She just didn't know what was meant when it was said.

Elsa: What was said was always meant and what went unsaid was never meant.

_Huh. I make it seem all so simple, as if I have all of it figured out _thought Anna.

Elsa came across some snow and rabidly lowered herself to look at it. Anna sat on the grass nearby. All she wanted was sleep and for this bad mood to go away. More than just bad, it was a depressing mood. All Anna could find in herself to feel was despair. She was deadweight and she knew it. And Elsa, innocent Elsa, she had no idea.

"Do you ever wonder if anyone ever died on an exact spot you are in sometimes?"

"No Elsa, I can't say I have."

It depressed her. It was a horrible day with dead trees, dead ground and Anna feeling like dead weight. She felt so wrong, out of place. Elsa was bullied everyday and never slept enough. She was obsessive and lost and everything found its way to make her confused. And yet she could lose herself to snow and seem better.

But was she really so free.?

Why was Anna not so?

"Elsa, are you happy?"

Her voice cracked as she said so.

_Oh no._

Anna could feel herself tired quickly. Her brain had stopped suppressing her emotions. All the thinking about happiness, anyone's happiness, made Anna depressed by comparison. And the day they were in was getting longer, a minute was an hour away.

Anna stood up defensively, hyperventilating, and Elsa turned around and stood up herself. Something in the her mind suddenly became very sensitive. Elsa knew she needed to act. But after, yes, afterwards, she would think about.

"Anna, why are you upset?"

Elsa already decided she had messed up. A good friend would have noticed this before now. But now she could look all she wanted. Anna was holding back a tear and Elsa bore straight into her.

She saw it.

And then she had tears. Elsa told herself all of it was just water. She was not the upset one. She wasn't aware until now that anyone was upset.

But her heart felt suddenly heavier. She was panicking inside. Anna looked right at her, not daring to look anywhere else.

_Oh no, no. Anna is upset. I should help her. How!? Oh no. She is getting worse._

_A hug._

Elsa ignored her own tears and went after Anna's. She looked like she was about to say something but the impact of Elsa hugging her was a pleasant interruption. The next moment, in the view of the trees, the marshes and the snow, Anna bawled into Elsa's shoulder. She had won the battle of tears with gasping swiftness.

Snivelling, shaking and crying quite loudly, Elsa stoically stood and hugged her best friend. Her only friend, so tightly. Her own tears were quiet.

The words Anna tried to utter came out almost a gargle and Elsa had to force herself to listen to Anna's voice through the tears.

"I-I'm sssso sorry E-Elsa. I don't...I don't know what's with me."

Anna returned, this time to Elsa's collarbone. Elsa herself was crying, but she was much more in control. On the surface. Beneath it, she was trembling to restrain unfettered panic. She was holding up to now. At this moment, all she could think about was making sure Anna was alright.

Anna breathed deeply and spoke again, her face much redder.

"I'm just so worried Elsa. Oh god, I am s-so worried."

Elsa wasn't sure if she was supposed to stay like this, hugging hard, or give Anna space. She just knew that she really, really did not want to let go.

"Anna, do you need a moment? To think?"

Anna saw no alternative. _God, I must be freaking Elsa out. Get a hold of yourself, you idiot._

Anna prised her head back far enough to look at Elsa. Elsa's eyes shifted away. Anna knew Elsa found eyes frightening to stare into. And yet, she felt Elsa feared her. That she had scared her.

"Elsa, are you alright?"

She still hadn't looked up. But for Elsa, there was no alternative.

"I am not looking in your eyes. But not because I'm scared. It is because I want to help and I want you to tell me how."

Anna said nothing, thinking over her answer. She sniffled, but it sounded like half a word.

Elsa took Anna's cheeks in her hands and raised her head. Then, against all instinct and security in Elsa's own mind, she looked Anna right in her eyes.

Those pale blue dots, leaking onto her face, were the eyes of her friend. Elsa wanted Anna to know she was not alone. That Elsa really did care and was not cold to her feelings, even if neither of them knew what was wrong. Even if it seemed like all of the universe had decided to hurt them.

Anna was awe-struck through the droll. Elsa never looked into people's eyes. Ever, as far as she knew.

"Oh my god Elsa. You brave thing, you. I hate myself for bothering you with this. I really do." She hyperventilated sharply.

Elsa's eyes lowered, evidently quite overwhelmed and for a moment they were squeezed shut. The elders own, lesser tears began to sting.

"Anna, I think you are worth quite a bit of bother. I might even say a heap of bother." Elsa's lips made a small smirk and her eyes opened.

"Thank you, Elsa. I'm just scared about the future. And about myself. I think."

Anna plopped herself down on a rock. Elsa was staring at the snow.

_I stopped crying, so she stopped listening. You sad fool._

Elsa abruptly asked "What parts of the future scare you Anna?"

_Have more faith. She was listening._

Anna didn't know where to begin and she felt a quiver to think of her saturated feelings. Feelings so banal and everyday now that they bored even Anna. But pain was constant and persistent, especially psychological pain.

"Does all of it count?"

Elsa was confused and took a minute to answer.

"Do feelings count? As in, numbers, or as in, that they matter? Or was that question rhetorical?"

Anna rolled her eyes at herself. She hoped to heaven Elsa did not see it.

"Yeah, sorry it was rhetorical. Well actually, more like exaggeration."

Elsa was honestly stumped over what to say. What to say to comfort the afflicted? She boggled over this often. But her loyalty to Anna ensured she would not rest until Anna was feeling better. So she sat beside Anna and placed a hand very gently, almost agonisingly so, on her shoulder. Elsa was doing her damnest to be slow and thoughtful, even maybe subtle.

"Now, now. It's ok. And if it's not, it will be. Probability demands it. Time will pass, you will see this snow turn to rain and it will make you sleepy again. You will be ok."

Anna was not all that re-assured, purple though Elsa's prosaic comfort was. Anna knew she was trying. But it was a case of a computer program uploaded to a different system. Elsa was not all that adjusted to providing comfort. Anna knew this and also wished she did not.

_Hmm, then again few people ever seem to comfort Elsa. That's how you learn._

But despite it all, Anna did feel different. Not better, but different. She had been so caught in herself she was almost forgetting Elsa was there. And Elsa was there. Motionless, waiting for words to be said. Then Anna realised that's why it was so quiet.

"I hope it gets better. I do."

Elsa continued rubbing Anna's shoulder.

"Hope is easily said Anna and hardly done. You're stressed. The weather doesn't help. Cold dark weather makes low dry moods."

Anna was feeling a little eased. Elsa was right. It was a miserable day. It was part of the reason for her angst.

"Anna, what do you want to do?"

"I don't know."

"We can sit here and let you relax. I can hear birds. You like birds."

She reached into her pocket.

"And I have chocolate for you. I won't need it."

Anna smiled a tiny bit. The sight of chocolate made everything a little better.

"Are you sure, Elsa?"

Elsa made out to be displeased. "Anna, I've offered you chocolate. I wonder, does that mean I offered you chocolate?"

Anna sniffled a smile and a quick laugh. "Ok, bossy boots. I shall take your chocolate."

Elsa looked pleased with herself. "And you shall enjoy it."

"By all the gods, from Yahweh to Zeus, I shall enjoy Elsa's chocolate" And Anna puffed out her chest. She hyperventilated right after it.

She nibbled into it and looked off to the distance.

"Better?"

Anna seemed relieved.

"Yeah."

"Life lasst longer than we can imagine just now. 20 years or more, we will find this time small. Because the more days we live, the shorter they seem."

"Elsa what's your point?" Anna asked nothing but confused.

"The long days will get shorter. Thus the bad days will too."

"But won't the good days go the same way?"

"Of course they will. That's the nature of time. But you will make it count. Because no matter what you do, you make people happy."

"Why am not happy, then. Why did I break?"

"Because bad things happened. You messed up at school and then it all piled up. Before you knew it, everything seemed infinite. You are not broken Anna. Don't say that. All your bones are fine."

Elsa stopped, realising what she might be doing.

"Sorry, am I helping?"

Anna didn't know what to say.

"You aren't harming"

Elsa wasn't satisfied.

"That's not what I asked."

"Look, why does it matter to you? You don't worry about these things."

"On whose account, Anna? Have you ever asked if I think about the way others see me or whether I see myself as a good person? I know I am strange and I miss a lot but I see a lot, Anna. I think I see more than everyone thinks I do."

Anna wanted to cry out of guilt and shame. What kind of person was she, to question her friend like that? A friend she knew was never sure of herself when it came to matters emotional?

"So when I tell you you're not broken, I say it because I mean it and because I have put alot of thought into it."

"Why does everyone else say it and yet it's only when you say it seems..."

"Real?"

"Yeah."

Anna sobbed quietly again. Elsa was looking everywhere but at Anna. She knew she couldn't look at upset people well. It would make her feel the same. She already felt it; she just didn't have tears coming back yet.

"I don't know Anna. If I knew, I would tell you."

Anna knowingly looked at Elsa. She must feel so out her depth she was drowning_._

_That door has opened and this time I feel it._

What she felt was whatever misery the world had cast upon her. Anna was scared for her friendships. Some people, she hadn't spoken to in months. Good people who did no wrong. Elsa. Sweet Elsa who stood by her and didn't meet Anna out of any kind of social need but because she wanted to.

Perhaps it was better to have a friend who was different.

_But what do I mean by that? What gives me the right to think of Elsa as different or special? And why does it help me? You are stupid Anna. As if I alone understand Elsa. As if all Elsa is to you is some emotional dry wall for you to paint in thick dark sadness._

Anna was not to know that Elsa felt no one understood her. Elsa, so alone yet she was friends with someone who so desperate to avoid it but powerless to stop it herself.

And Elsa, so desperate to help her friend, the only one she had to name.

It would have struck them strange that two brains so close and bonded by years could keep such interesting things from each other. All in the name boundaries that were never set by people they did not know. It was amazing what your elders made you believe without meaning to.

Because if one knew what the other wanted to ask, many questions would come answered.

All this out of fear and out of worries of causing each other pain.

Both of them, especially Elsa, suffered a different pain from all the other ones: The pain of ignorance.

"I have one theory about us." Elsa said with an astute expression.

"What's that?"

"We work well because we are so different. You make everyone feel better about themselves because you can't help it and I haven't got anyone in my life that does that for me. And you look for me once you are tired of the comforting words and euphemisms everyone tells you. If I offered you a comforting lie, you would feel insulted.

You are so unlucky Anna, to be so nice and kind and beautiful. Because everyone takes it for granted and I hate it. They ask you to go to something or other or hang out in droves and for long times and you go because to them you are Anna and Anna wants to be around everyone and for you its being nice and its being fair.

It exhausts you and no wonder." Elsa was feeling entranced in her own monologue and she felt compelled to speak in a way and manner that until now she was too afraid to step to.

Anna had never heard Elsa so emphatic before.

"It angers you?"

"Yes Anna. Because we are like sisters. "The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb." We chose to be friends. I see you only so often but when I do it is never for nought. You make me feel less alone and I take you seriously. I don't want to sound presumptuous but I think if you were taken more seriously, you wouldn't feel like death everyday and you wouldn't give me that look I hate to see but know you can't help: The look of utter defeat in your eyes in school and in your room. The exhaustion you feel. Your family would think twice before they just called you lazy or silly for wanting more sleep or taking breaks.

If I felt the way you did, I would be dead by now. I couldn't cope."

Elsa looked with cold but life-filled eyes right at Anna. She had meant every word but now she was exhausted.

"Elsa, are _you_ alright?"

Elsa grimaced as her brain caught up to her.

"I've made it about me again. I'm sorry."

Elsa did not cry but Anna knew the girl had emptied herself of a great deal of feelings. And it was so unlike Elsa it left Anna reeling. She only did this occasionally when she felt really sure of it all.

"We should talk more about each other Elsa. I think you were harsh on everyone but...it's kind of true."

"Anna, I know nothing about people but I know a lot about you. Others are strange and their motivations I don't think I'll ever understand. But I recognise when someone is being pushed too far."

"But how did you know all that? How?"

Elsa gave it a thought. It had all been up there, in her mind, worrying her. She spoke for a long time, as she always did. It made just as little sense to her. Emotions tended to blur lines and enchant memories. It was a lovely thing, but it boggled her like so many things did. Elsa hated unknowns so much.

"I guess I'm more perceptive than I realised."

The sun was almost gone. It was February yes but the sky remained convinced it was winter. Elsa didn't mind.

They stood up and began their walk back. For two girls so young and barely above ten, they had spoke a lot about things some much older would never admit to thinking or believing, even if it was just to themselves.

"I think we could all learn from you Elsa, if we listened." _Cus that doesn't sound condescending._

Elsa turned to Anna and smiled jokingly.

"Now now, gingerlocks, I've been saying that for years."

"That you have Blondie. That you have."

**Back to the present**

It was Friday. Each day of the week, John and Elsa had been meeting at his house and listening to select songs John would pick out for her. In exchange Elsa would suggest TV shows. John liked the sound of House. He had a television in a sitting room. It was really more of a glorified hallway, lined with books.

"So he's a renegade doctor?"

"No. Well, he is but he's more of a Sherlock Holmes if he was a doctor. The cases are interesting and it's routine. There aren't too many big changes per episode. I guess you can say I like it samey."

"Ok but you know I get restless just watching things. Are you sure?"

"You'll like it."

"Ok Elsa, I shall try it."

And they watched it. They were halfway through the pilot when John's mother, as always, entered his space with no warning. Annoyed at this overture more than usual for breaking the tenuous concentration onto the screen, John stood up slightly to angrily.

"Son, this came for you."

He took it and said a dead thank you before turning his head to Elsa.

"Just a second."

He took a knife from a drawer built into the wall and opened the letter cautiously. He wasn't telling Elsa, but this letter was tinged with uncertainty and fear for him. She found the blade more drawing.

"You keep a knife?"

He spoke computically, with little attention paid to anything beyond the letter.

"For opening letters. Plus with our not being in America..." He took out the slip of paper carefully and with as little touch as he could.

"...No need for...a gun."

"What do you mean? That doesn't make sense."

But Elsa stopped talking, stood up and realised John wasn't looking at her at all. He wasn't listening. He was not even really breathing.

The awful thing about it was how suddenly it took hold of him. He seemed relaxed before and Elsa was beginning to feel at ease being around him as well. Their steps were slow but their similarities played to their strengths as people. Plus on House, the case had just gotten interesting.

But he was paler than ever. He had taken on the robes of a corpse and the shock of the wounded.

The note was simple, not even long. But it meant everything to John. Not all things good, nor all things bad.

_Dear John,_

_Meet me, in our spot. _

_May 12__th__. Saturday._

_We will have a talk of things._

_Love Isabelle._

**Authors commentary:**

**Yes, we will finally learn a bit about Isabelle. Ill have to correct past entries of her name. Hope you are liking where i am going with this. Any reviews are appreciated.**

**Authors Notes: **

**This one was all set to go about 4 days ago but i just couldnt get onto editing the thing for some days, i was out of energy for some time. Took me longer than it should have. **

**I will update when i can. Thank you.**


	12. Chapter 12

Getting onto the bus, given the rushed morning, was not fun, Elsa being anxious, she wasn't used to buses. Loud, clattering things that were unclean. She sympathised with any person poor enough to require them. Living in a small community, she didn't leave Arndell much. She wasn't big on travelling. She adored new places. She hated getting there. A simple problem, whose solution, she found, was to not bother.

The day was overcast. It was about 8 in the morning. It was a very appropriate shade of light. Grey, but not rainy. Elsa had to admit it was strangely captivating. Watching the clouds swirl dead and silent. It was like watching a giant walk in utter silence.

John had made clear she did not have to come but after he explained what was going on, at least partially, she felt she must come.

John had explained that Isabelle was a friend of his from his past; he lived in the city then. Loso was a city that connected all the small outlying areas in this region. It was a place n decline, but still being developed. A bridge connected it to countryside to the south. Arndell was situated to its North-west. About 12 miles away. Other small towns dotted around the area.

Both of them had similar views about cities. John thought that they were good for spreading ideas and meeting new people but that to live in as a person, it was hellish. Elsa simply hated going there. The noise was too much for her. So they both did not want to go but both must.

Before they had left, they went to Anna's home. Ida greeted them.

"Oh hi, you two. Here to see Anna?"

They both nodded.

"Oh well, come on in."

Anna had said to Elsa before that she could visit whenever she was waiting for the bus. The stop was right next to her house, after all.

After fighting through Ida's welcome they were plopped in the living room. John got to witness Elsa walking with a subtle confidence. This was a place she felt secure in.

John felt there was history here.

Anna was there, looking at the television with half sleeping eyes. She turned to the duo and smiled. John was wearing a leather jacket with badges adorning it. It looked old. Elsa was wearing her bright blue fleece and she looked oddly funny when seated.

"Hey." She said, barely breathing.

"Fine weather we are having" muttered Elsa.

The silence was palpable to John. He didn't want this. Not this quiet, not like normal. The weather had him thinking of country. Then he touched on a passage he knew and he felt compelled to speak.

"Ours is a lonely miserable island, where it rains, sleets, snows and howls of wind. The people are plain looking, the beer is disgusting, the history shameful. Nothing good to look back on and not much to look forward to. The wrong family members are in government. We have nothing to trade except tea which we stole from the east. And half the world hates us for giving birth to the other half, from the bald eagles land to the island of prisoners. But it is home and I should surely die for it."

Anna was impressed.

"Is that about us?"

"Well about this country, yeah."

"Fascinating." She smiled at him warmly, not wanting him to feel awkward.

"You have a very good memory."

"I don't know if I do. But I like memorising things of interest."

Elsa was sitting silent and in some repose. She hadn't looked at Anna yet and she noticed. But said nothing. Something they could both indulge in.

"Elsa has a good memory. Don't you?"

Elsa looked at them. She and John sat on one couch while Anna practically lay on the other.

"I have a memory from when I was 3. Which means I have a memory from the previous millennium."

"That's right and what was the memory?"

Elsa's face was warmer now and she felt at ease.

"My parents wedding. I remember standing next to them in the street in a dress. I remember it was a sunny day. And I remember I was cold."

John chimed in.

"My memory's always been spotty. There's bits I don't fancy going back to and bits I haven't quite got round to yet, I've always been like that."

"I know what you mean." Added Anna. "Sometimes, you wonder if it's worth remembering it all." She finished knowingly.

Elsa was anxious to go.

"Is it time?"

John checked his watch.

"It's time."

"Anna, I thank you for letting us wait." And he bowed slightly.

"That's alright. Anytime is a good time."

John left out the door and nodded to Elsa, saying he would wait outside.

Checking quickly to see he had went, Anna looked to Elsa.

"Elsa, what's going on with you two? Why are you going to Loso?"

Elsa was hovering at the doorway to the lobby.

"I could tell you but...I don't know yet." And she turned around and left without a second look. Was it a joke? A jest, out of fear? She wasn't sure. But she was not quite in her element.

But she was intrigued about it all.

They made their way, were on the bus and quickly set themselves down close to the door. Each of them had with them headphones to isolate themselves from the sounds. John had music in his. But after about 5 minutes he decided he had best tell Elsa what to expect. Isabelle was a challenge as a person for him. He likened to preparing a soldier for a bombing.

"Who is Isabelle and how do you feel about visiting her?"

"I hope you are prepared for a long answer." And with that he produced his phone, Elsa nodding in agreement.

Each of them had thought it out the day before, once John had gotten over his nervousness and what looked like fear. Each wore headphones plugged into their phones. The din of the bus, which neither could stand, Elsa because she felt scared by such loudness, and John because he was already feeling quite vulnerable, was to be avoided.

So they hatched a somewhat complicated plan. One would call the other through their phone and speak that way. Less noise, clearer voices. To say they got odd looks is to say the sun is bright. John was thinking this more than usual.

_Call connected._

"Can you hear me?"

"I can hear you."

He took a breath that puffed outward with a barely audible moan. If he had felt it before, who would have said he felt hung-over.

"Isabelle is someone I knew before I moved to Arndell. A friend. She and I met in Loso some years past. We used to go to the same school.

To say she was fascinating is not enough. Isabelle was an encapsulating person. You see, back then, when I was 9 or ten, I was alone. Completely. The parents were in trouble, Mum and I didn't get on. I was difficult to get alone with. I remember you saying on Wednesday that as a kid, or should I say, younger kid, you were quite physical and snarled at people you didn't like."

"Which was most of them."

"Yes, well I was similar. They thought much of my anger as a child but after a while you get sick of being so feared so I went quiet."

"There IS a point to this story? I don't feel I've learned much and we're halfway there."

John smiled sheepishly. "Give me time to finish.

Well when I was quiet I was not shunned but annoyed with everyone. Nothing was interesting. Nothing was lovely or worth loving. Not a thing was worth doing. I had no energy for anything beyond the school work."

_Reminds me of Anna, _She thought.

"At home I was in my room counting time and sleeping and at school I was alone. Being around others just reminded me of it and when you see them, the others, in their groups. Security, understanding, even a bit of friendship seemed beyond me."

_He does talk a lot about himself._

Isabelle was there. She had been for a few years, but I never got round to asking her who she was. She was quite timid and apologetic as people go. Always saying sorry. She taught me that there is always a reason to say sorry, and that it wasn't always because it was true or right.

Full of myself and believing I could win her over to my side, I started to converse with her. Talking to girls is not my strong suit at all. But back then it was with everyone. But Isabelle for whatever reason was accommodating."

_Ok, so she was shy._

John was feeling anxious as heaven willed him to go on. He did not think Providence or sad memories so powerful but here he was close to tears.

"Do you want to stop, John?"

"I think I will."

She placed a hand on his shoulder and made efforts to look more towards him.

She looked unwell doing it but this was because of the pain in her arms. She was so tired.

"You are more powerful than you think you are."

John looked right at Elsa and frightened her for a brief moment. To be full, he looked positively skinless with fear.

"That's what scares me."

The rest of the journey went uneventfully by and neither said anything. John thought he might cry and Elsa contended herself with looking out the window.

Loso was an industrial city who could thank its current state to the end of empire with a little help from the eighties. It was a middle city, in that it was not the largest city around, but it was not small enough to be a town and thus, lacking either sharp end, often was overlooked in local media.

In shor time, they had left the bus.

John knew where he was going.

"Ok Elsa. Are you sure you want to help me with this?"

Elsa rolled her eyes. "I wouldn't have come this far if I was not."

John smiled. "Well then, let's get to it."

The city centre was the only place with any real life in Loso. Buses and cars went about, there was a shopping centre and on one street, a hoard of restaurants. Elsa had been here before and had hated it every time. Her mum and she did not get on and it had put her off shopping for clothes for life.

The city reminded her of her mother's irritability. And all that she loathed of it.

She had never dared ask what John's relations with his own mother were like, but she rarely heard him speak to her and he never spoke about her.

"By the way, what did your Mum say when you told her you were coming here?"

"Very little. Come along, across this street here."

There was a vast river that sat south of the city centre. It wasn't too far a walk and after a few backstreets they had made it to the edge. The streets were peopled by shops dealing in Hardware. She recognised one building, with a car park beneath it. She had performed with her Violin there. But it gave her no warm feeling. It only reminded her how long it had been since then. Time made everyone lonely.

They reached their point after ten minutes. It was not a beach, more like a front. A steel railing followed it the whole way and the houses around them were what Elsa thought as posh and they left a considerable gap between themselves and the sea, in respect to the footpath.

She was trying hard to keep her cool on. All the noise and kerfuffle was right on her limiting point. But the sea calmed her. The day still was grey, the bridge jutting high above them, linking to the land in the distance by what must have been half a mile, it was to her very grand and new and she decided this was enough to keep going.

There was a sort of viewing deck up a cylindrical staircase. On its face it looked towards the sea, to its back was a street leading past the harbour. The duo had come instead from the right.

Elsa could feel herself jumping at the prospect. She liked a commanding view.

"John, can we head up there" pointing, on her toes, towards the structure.

John chuckled singularly in response, trying to caress his nerves.

"I'd rather not."

_John has a fear? Well well._

Elsa was feeling a little darker of heart, thanks to the sea, and only John was there to meet her mild brutality.

"Oh, what's that? Scared, are we? Come on. Looking down doesn't do harm." She said her teases with an actor's charm. John was still in his own world and really, really did not relish moving that world in his head upwards by 30 paces.

But he started walking towards her and passed her, not once looking at her, and made for the stairs.

"It isn't the heights I am afraid of. Hitting the ground at high speed just tends to be more likely at height."

"Stop explaining everything and get a move on, you are slow to climb."

_He must be in a bad mood. I suppose I knew but...now I'm sure._

He clambered as slowly as he dared with Elsa close behind him as the steps pushed a clink out with every footstep. Eventually, he made it to the top, holding on to the railing. He looked no to the sea but to the wires just beneath the railing. There were padlocks strewn around them, attached and hanging like torn flags in wartime cities, holding to their metal masts in spite of wind, sea and potential fire.

As Elsa approached the top herself, John's gait lowered slightly. He still stood on two feet but he looked paralysingly nervous, ever paler than he had been the night before. His hands shook, of course.

Elsa was looking at him despite eagerly wanting to look at the water. Something told her something. Two nothings were trying to connect in her mind. One, the figure of John looking almost sick and two, the padlocks. She, unlike him, did not know what they meant. What they were used to symbolise. But she was worried for John, who was breathing without air at this point. He was reaching a fever pitch of something. Was it fear? Was it anger? She couldn't for the life of her tell.

But she was to discover it, when a figure marched towards them from some distance below. Elsa noticed John was looking with all his soul entirely on just a padlock, to the direction of the sea. To their direct right, from under the bridge, the same way they had came, a girl walked along the waterfront.

She had purpose with each step and a head that was hanging slightly, looking at the ground. She looked harmless, but something told Elsa this was the spectre of John's attentions. Mysterious.

She wore simple clothes; a pink coat that looked like it was suited to rain. Basic jeans. Forgettable shoes. She had sandy coloured hair and looked quite short, even to the relatively short Elsa with the height above her they were. Nothing about her seemed remotely interesting.

Why was she looking so intently at this ordinary individual?

Why wasn't John?

_Crap._

She turned to look behind her. It seems they had both been receiving the same signal. But John found it much more horrifically intelligible.

He was looking down now but his body faced towards Elsa and the girl. He had seen what Elsa had and for a moment, they were united in sight. But Elsa hadn't been aware. She had an unconscious feeling she should not let John know what she had saw. That she should protect him.

After a week, she had gotten used to him being timid, but not fearful. They were both so, but Elsa always asked questions and John loved answering them. That was their out. That was how their story moved forward when things slowed down.

But what the hell could she say now? If she said a single word she got the idea he would screech and run. He looked like a terrified dog.

"Helloooooo?" The exasperated voice melodised.

He raised his head slightly and was looking slightly down. Still pale but not quite contorted to resemble a corpse. He looked away from the sea, back to the stairs. Elsa looked where he did.

There was a moment where the sea sang and the birds far from them could be heard. The breath of cars passing in the distance was the most surrounding sound of all. Without looking away from the stairs, John held out a shaking hand towards Elsa. It took her a second to notice it but the minute she saw it, she knew what it meant. They were facing the stairs, not each other but they could grasp after a quick effort by Elsa.

John felt Elsa's hand and felt it was even colder than his own, which were above all, numb. It was a strange reassurance for him, that Elsa felt cold. If she was less scared, but even more cold, it must not be so terrifying.

_Fear is paper thin._

He took the step forwards and Elsa coordinated herself to walk alongside him. The stairs had the width for both. His feet felt much shakier but he persisted down the steps carefully as he could.

And as he did, he felt, as the height lowered, almost calm. But it wasn't a calmness he had normally. This one was born of fearful anticipation. It had become so heightened in that feeling he had numbed himself to it enough that he could move down the steps. Unconsciously they got lower and John stopped thinking for a moment. About what he had to face. About what had led to it. About what his Mother knew.

His only safety, his only security or sanity left, was from holding Elsa's hand. And this gave him an ounce of strength.

He would meet Isabelle and they would have a talk of things.

_Let the madness begin._

They had reached the bottom after what was simply not a long enough walk. Elsa, awkward though she felt, had a determination about her that she gained being up there. John was a machine. He had no emotions dripping over. Instead, they sat on top of him, waiting to fall.

Isabelle spoke. "I was wondering when you'd come down."

She looked very obviously at Elsa and for the first time Elsa looked at her properly.

She had a face, plain as sand but with eyes that bore right into her, green as envy. Elsa was immediately uncomfortable but, knowing how it felt to have eyes looking at you, returned the look. She had to fight not to struggle. Her face itched.

Turning to John, who was looking down still, she continued: "Who's this, then?"

Elsa was about to speak when John mumbled.

"She's a friend. Called Elsa."

Isabelle looked back at Elsa, cooing almost.

"You've got yourself a decent name there. So why are you with him, feeling a bit weak are you? Ou quelque chose d'autre?"

_She speaks French. Ok then._

"Comment ça ?! We're just tired. It's been-"

"Yeah, yeah, early mornings are murder, go moan to someone else. Everyone should get up early, eh John?"

He still looked to the ground but was puzzled.

Mournfully he mumbled.

"Maybe. You spoke French?"

He looked up, his curiosity alerted.

Isabelle kept her cool.

"Yep, seems your little Elsa here can do it too. Qui te l'a dit ?"

Elsa did not appreciate Isabelle's apparent arrogance but she made herself stay quiet about any kind of worries just now. You didn't interrupt a potential enemy when they are making a potential mistake.

_So she's my enemy now?_

"Personne. Je suis une -taught." She replied.

She smiled.

Isabelle replied with the same. They were standing in a sort of pivot shape. Elsa and John at its support end.

"Well, John can't speak it. He's always been...lazy about self improvement. Il est plus silencieux qu'avant."

"Self-improvement?" Elsa asked.

John looked a bit downwards again. He really wanted to both look away and look straight at Isabelle. He wanted two things but was content with neither. His brain couldn't make up or down seem grounded.

"I'm better than I used to be, I've been..." He struggled.

Elsa noticed that the other girl was looking at John in a different light for a moment. For a split second, their relationship was clear. Elsa surprised herself. She got it.

_I understand._

Isabelle meanwhile, seemed cold to his stutters.

"Oh, c'mon John, you love permanence and keeping things the same."

Elsa was startled when John cleared his throat and looked up. She hadn't expected him to jutter to life.

"I have tried to change. I don't claim success. I don't know what you want me to say. That's the truth."

"Tu sais, c'est un menteur compulsif."

"He is quiet but not un menteur." She retorted.

Still standing, he was perplexed. "What are you two saying?". His confidence was going down already. He did not like being kept out of the loop.

Isabelle began gesturing with her hands as she, becoming animated but in a very rigid, much trained way.

"Elsa, he has been since he was 5. Sa mère était une alcoolique, tu sais."

Elsa was in no mood to be witness to Johns dressing down. He looked sick already with it, having gained a piece of himself back 10 minutes before.

"And so? That is not his fault. What happened? How do you two know each other?" She was starting to speak with a pitch in her voice, squeeky now, but not forever. It was lowering.

John went even more sullen. Isabelle looked at him and caught him in the act.

"Oh, he doesn't look well, Elsa. Either you have made him ill or he hasn't told you."

She spoke as if she were speaking to a child she had been forced to sit.

_What does she mean? Tell me what?_

It was Elsa's turn to look at John. The two girls looking at him was making him pick at his skin. He was not himself.

"John...why haven't you mentioned her?" She begged.

Isabelle could see he was on edge. Elsa's ignorance was just a bonus for her.

"Il a honte de moi."

Elsa ignored that last. Isabelle spoke French mechanically, with no spirit or apparent understanding of what she was conveying. Elsa felt a little insulted for it. She loved French, its words, how it was spoken. She had learned it partly out of respect for her Father, who spoke it much better.

This was a mental as well as partly physical game of chess and Elsa would sooner stalemate than lose.

"I'm ashamed...of myself." He moaned.

Isabelle was crossing her arms while Elsa repeated herself.

"What haven't you mentioned?"

John pulled his hand across his hair, aching with the loss of words.

"I was..."

Isabelle burst in to words, speaking from her past, dripping each few words with a mixture of regret and exasperation.

"He was obsessive. We used to consider ourselves companions. Friends. I liked him, he liked me. The usual garbage. And like garbage, he decided it was best to flee."

"Flee?"

"Oui. I was his intérêt particulier or obsessive subject. Wanted to know everything there was to know about me and I didn't like it."

Isabelle turned to him, feeling like the victor.

"But the way he reacted when I said so..."

John was crying. Silently and shamefully he shed tears. Elsa walked two steps toward him. She started patting his shoulder as he sat on the first step.

"It's what I am!" He wailed. "It's what I'm like. I didn't mean to..."

"Oh save it. I got what I wanted." She said with no emotion.

"What you wanted? I made it clear. Our emails, they have a tale to tell, it's all there. And we said we would not speak me out here." His eyes were becoming sodden and he was not well at all. He had never felt so ill. His stomach felt like it had metal bars twisting through it.

"And like a twat, you followed. Il a essayé de décréditer des personnes. Ceux à qui on parle" She said, turning to Elsa, she continued. "He wanted everything to be just me and him**.** He was controlling, he was manipulative, but now he's just pathetic."

Elsa was getting too much info to handle. She wasn't sure how to weigh things out. She felt helpless towards John and Isabelle, each in a different way.

"How long has it been since you spoke last?"

"A year and a half?" She said, not quite sure.

"Why come back? Why haven't you walked away, content to hurt someone who hurt you?" She was looking at Isabelle now with real power and assurance of self. John was weakened but Elsa felt secure. Their being mutual francophones meant Elsa could speak to Isabelle free of John's awareness. To spare his feelings, she told herself.

"Oh ho ho. You are looking at me like some kind of Vulcan. Is it a struggle?" She said, mocking the blonde.

"Not a struggle, an action. I get by fine." Elsa retorted.

"Actions do not always parlent plus fort que les mots." Isabelle mixed the two languages, once warring with each other, as it did today as it does in this confrontation.

"Oui, tu as raison. Sometimes it's what we don't do that says more." Elsa was speaking as if reaching some kind of finishing point. She was positive that Isabelle was enjoying this heel kicking.

John could sense Elsa's raison d'être was...renewed. "Elsa..."

Isabelle was grinning with some atrocious glee.

"Oh, she is a clever, fancies she has a brain. Reminds me of someone."

She winked at John, who stubbornly refused to notice it.

"What do you want, Isabelle?" Elsa asked, feigning innocence. She stood up and walked slighty from John, to give him room to breath and draw her opponents attention away from the centre.

"When I came here at first, it was all so clear but like anyone who is absorbed this much in meeting new people, I guess I'm not so sure now." Elsa hated her speaking, French or english. Every word just dripped with derision.

"I suggest choices are made. And that people know where they stand. John, can you get up, please?" Elsa said, sounding professional

Elsa was surprised when Isabelle suddenly threw something metal-looking at John, who was by now practically lying down, satisfied with his decrepitude.

"Get up, you fucking wastrel!" She said, voice raised.

Elsa was depressed with how this was going.

_He didn't even do anything. I didn't even do anything._

And she looked to see John pick up the object and hold it preciously, sobbing restarted. Then he stood up with a soldiers echo.

"J'ai fait mes choix. I suggest you speak with him more socratically and discover what it was."

Elsa looked at Isabelle, shy and burdened.

"Oh good, you know what I mean. You must have a good memory, blondie."

"Knowledge is meaningless without the intelligence to wield it."

Isabelle, for the first time, looked genuine in manner, and that manner was impressed.

"Wow. You must know nothing, to be so wise."

Elsa honestly was puzzled, not by what she said but by how she meant it. Her inertia still in play. Her next move was critical.

Just then, John regained himself.

"Well, you know what they say. "The world is full of dangerous amateurs."

As he said this he stood up. He hyperventilated and shuddered into standing. He looked at Isabelle's nose, neutral ground to look upon.

"Recovered are you? Or should I expect you to go ape?" She paused thoughtfully.

"Then again, maybe Miss Francophone there will be the one to go autistic rage on me, the way she's looking at me."

Elsa noticed the key responses in herself and in John. His fists clench and his face puffed ever so little. She knew, without needing to be told, that John was more than hurt. He was angry. And despite her doubts about him, she concluded she was leaving here with him, as a friend ought to, because he trusted her to come along and she suspected there was still much she did not know.

Within, she found herself puzzled and defensive. All eyes were on Isabelle now. But neither John nor Elsa could tell what effect it had on her. But for the first time, it seemed they had, without speech, commenced a coordinated act against an aggressor. They were not to stand apart.

"Oh, she doesn't know? Qu'elle est malade? I'd have thought she'd know, hanging out with a weird boy like you."

"Qu'est-ce que tu veux dire ? Que quelque chose ne va pas chez moi ? Or him?"

Isabelle gently rubbed her hands.

"Oh, it's a fine thing, to know something so intimate about someone else. Even better, you don't know!? Talk about freaky." Isabelle glanced at her with playful hurting eyes.

"Don't know what?" She asked, Elsa now bearing a gentle anger.

John firmly but gently raised a hand, pushing it downwards in the air as a disarming gesture.

"Elsa, I'll explain. Later."

Isabelle, felt, for the first time, disappointed. Not at what John said, but at how Elsa reacted. She nodded to him. It was a nice gesture. Gestures shouldn't be so calm. She had seen in Elsa a need to ask questions. A Socratic soul. But she was patient too. Isabelle had little need for patience and sniffed it out of others.

Neither John nor Elsa knew, but they had repelled Isabelle away, for the moment.

"You two kids enjoy yourselves while I go away to leave the cry-baby and the Rain Girl. Je te recommande de lui demander, à propos de son cerveau."

"Adieu."

And Isabelle walked confidently away from them, from the sea. Elsa suddenly found herself breathless from the strain.

John breathed in but did not drop his guard until that towering, playful individual he had once dedicated himself to...was far from them. Elsa waited, knowing his act. When he looked away and rubbed his eyes, she walked over, closing the distance.

"Are you alright?" He asked, scared, almost. Elsa had just walked back into his mind and he felt concern for her.

"I think that question is meant for you?"

"Let's say both."

Her hand returned to his shoulder. He appreciated it and turned to her. Slowly, he placed his hand on her shoulder. She did not mind it.

"May we hug, Elsa?"

Elsa was burned out. They both felt it. The weight of a common struggle.

Elsa nodded. "We may."

They hugged closely and each let their heads rest on the shoulder of the other. Neither thought of romance, nor of the person that drove them to hug. They just forgot it for that moment. A week had passed. Nearly two in fact. Each felt much better for it.

There was pain to be had. Questions to be asked. And confrontations to be dealt with. But Elsa, out of the hug, looked to the sea and hoped it would be all right, walking towards the railing while John stood.. She did not fool herself. She was very uncertain about where this friendship was headed, but she was interested. And she saw no reason to dispel that interest. Nor the means to.

John looked away from the sea, up at the bridge. He was trying to calm himself since the hug. Better himself but all he could was replay the last 20 minutes and he felt horrible towards all of it. Nothing good came from it. Nothing mattered.

He was just about to disown himself of it all and walk away, when he looked at the girl he called his friend now, looking out at the sea, steadying her soul. It was sobering. She probably wasn't aware, but John saw her hands draped just at the railing, the blueness of her fleece was standing out. John believed she looked, and was, powerful.

_I will be better. I will improve. And I will face it if I must. All of it._

_Elsa needs to know. About me. The Autism. Isabelle._

_And where did she learn French?_

And the sea swirled. Immortal.

**Authors Commentary:**

**Yes, at last. THis was a big one, both in story and in actual length. I wrote this one much quicker than previous ones, but i had good reason to hold off on publishing. I have poured alot of myself into this and i hope it had paid off. Chapter 13 will be forthcoming.**

**Authors Notes: Thank you to Kim immensely for the translation of the english lines to french lines. You are a star. **

**She is a bigger fan of Frozen than myself. Please check out her Tumblr ( .com) and her Youtube (**** c/Justlookatthosesausages?gvnc=1****) for many things Frozen.**

**I will update when i can.**


	13. Chapter 13

**Authors Commentary:**

**I wasn't stifled making this one. Instead, I had a few life events to consider: On the 30****th**** of July it was my 19****th**** birthday and 4 days later I went on a trip to Manchester as a sort of holiday. Being Autistic, this was all quite overwhelming. But seeing how those events happened, I decided to just have an actual break from writing while I was at it. I was more focused on documenting my trip. **

**I hadn't written a word by the time I was back home from England anyway and decided I needed time to breathe, so to speak. It was nice but in the end I had to write again, hence this chapter.**

**So while I won't apologise for the absence, I have explained it. I am genuinely sorry I gave no warning of this break beforehand. That was unfair. Thank you.**

Summer went by too slowly and left the separate pair wanting.

School ended with far too thorough a fanfare. Elsa said goodbye but was to her knowledge to opt out of the mandatory speech giving at the end. But, as she sadly expected, she was forced to give one. She was not terrified. Terrified was not a good enough word. Better it was something loud but small.

_Firecrackers!_

Regardless, they had a week to make it and began, in earnest. They were required to quote someone at its conclusion. Predictably, and betraying his ego, John jumped at the opportunity and ended up spending more time fishing for quotes on the computer than the actual speech.

For this, Elsa was surprised at how helpful and guiding he was when Elsa was writing her own and they worked on it with great focus, not addressing the past in any sense.

"Ok Elsa, the main parts of any speech are the beginning and the end. People don't care about the middle bits."

"Then why write a middle at all?"

"Because people expect speeches longer than that."

"Well, that's foolish." She pained.

"Yeah, it is, but it makes our lives easier to just give them it. Besides, writing is fun."

John was stricken with a suppressing force of mind. He was enacting Carpe Diem, but in reverse. Rather than live for the day as if he had few left, he merely made sure his life could be kept inside singular days and had been like this for a month now. Nothing mattered outside of that day, nothing grew. When he went to bed he believed, just for a second, that he wouldn't wake up. It gave him peace.

She did not know what he was up to and had stopped visiting him as much. They were on the same current and even heading in the same direction, but the rope that had tethered them together was starved to a thread. They had hardly talked and for Elsa, it had begun to look like another petered out friendship. But then, the speech came. After the weekend, it would come.

"Do you want to come back to mine and do it?"

She paused. Deliberately she waited. He had taking a shine to her again and she was in no mood for it. But she still humoured him and sought out what he wanted.

They agreed to go to his house, with a terseness rivalling Coolidge.

They arrived. John grimaced.

He stood, outside the house, looking at it, peering to look into the windows. Subtly was not easily found in the autistic spectrum. But attention to detail...

"Are you ok?"

He stood for a second. Taking stock, he found the house empty. Life was seizing it by the throat and John felt sure there was nothing good to be found in it again.

The smell he was used to was one of flowers. Elsa thought she could see a crack in the squared glass. Wondering what was different and why John was stationary, she began toward the door.

John threw his open palm back and, without looking, hit her shoulder and pushed her back with enough force she feared falling. She had not expected it. John hadn't either but still stood motionless. Elsa wasn't here. She wasn't a person to him heel and now. She was a feature in the details, part of the background. For him, there was the house.

"Please Elsa, don't go in there."

She rubbed her shoulder, now aching, and gave John a glare he deserved. But he did not look, his hands began to shake and he turned around, expecting Elsa's reply. He had made a mistake and he knew it too late.

He thought it would be a yelp, maybe a quick mutter or a shout. But he was even more terrified when Elsa instead spoke with so little wavering, he was sure she had beneath her skin a carbon fury. And he had just teased it to come out.

"Never do that. You have no idea what I will do."

She took her hand and grabbed his left shoulder and squeezed as hard as she could. He held for a moment but soon showed he was in pain.

"Because I don't either. I will knock you down and keep you there. If you overpower me, I will run, out-run, you. I'll pull your hair and when you open those lips to yelp ill pull out your teeth."

John was stationary.

"Do not test me, John Hardy, unless you want to see how hardy you are."

_Jesus._

Elsa could feel a timid rage brewing and looked right into John's eyes. Like other animals, it was a gesture to threaten him and she was surprised just how well it worked.

"Elsa, I-" He began to tear up. She let loose her grip but remained wedged fast on his collarbone. Tears saved him from Isabelle. But he had crossed a frontier now and Elsa would not budge.

Indeed her demeanour did not weaken, but warm up. She grabbed his cheek and pushed his tear away.

"I didn't..." He sniffled. "I didn't mean it. I just..." Now he was really beginning to cry.

"I'm sorry."

The wind picked up and each of them felt cold. Elsa to her back and John to his side. The trees tried to deafen them and the birds seemed to shriek with fear. They were flying away. Soft rain came on, kissing the ground, putting Elsa in mind of the word 'Lilac'. It had been there for some time, they were wrapped in a nutshell.

Hand absent, John rubbed it gently. Elsa could feel the dull ache come back and her adrenaline tapered off down unprepared paths round her body. She felt warm again after the winds temporary chilling. John remained cold.

"I can't accept your apology. Not until you tell me what's wrong. But I will hazard a guess. You're Mother?"

John nodded too quickly and each knew the basic truth. But the surface was untilled and, like their friendship, overgrown with unknown and dark green weeds. Elsa found it fitting, in a thimble-like moment of daydreaming, that she was wearing green. She liked the symbolism. It kept her mind off the worst of the malady.

_Why is it always about him?_

_But don't friends support each other?_

_True, but they don't cause each other pain._

_He acted rash, and I acted rightly. But he acted out of despair._

_What do I think despair is?_

_Depression is chronic, sadness is there and expected._

_Despair...is an endless flood. All too fast the structures of security of thought fall. That's what I think._

She looked at him, really stared into his face and tried to find something real, to hand.

_He is in pain. _

_For now, it can be about him._

_But I should think of myself more. He is not a one boy story. _

Elsa knew she was right. John was part of a million stories, just as Elsa was. He thought himself a tragic figure while Elsa thought herself singular and self-contained. Neither was better than the other. But John knew what he was. He just wished he could be his idea of Elsa.

Shaking legs and tearful eyes didn't change the fact that, to him, Elsa was the ultimate ideal mind, untamed by the world and all its own. He was so sure of this fact that he chose to believe he could become the same. But it didn't change what was objectively true outside his own mind.

"She drinks." He declared.

"I know." She replied.

"How did you-?"

"Isabelle: 'Alcooholique', plus the smell of ethanol is really hard to ignore, even in this wind."

"It's so bad. Pathetic." He moaned.

"Makes me feel sorry. For her and you." She delivered.

"Her?" He looked at Elsa with rage and held back a need to shout. He looked mad. Elsa was always brought into confusion by this word. But John's face gave it away to her. He was mad. In that moment, his mind lost clarity. While Elsa was having a field of it.

Tense they stood but still they stayed.

"I hate her, Elsa. I hate everything. The simpering, whimpering, sad emotions, the shouting, the tears, the SMELL!"

He began to pace in circles, orbiting an invisible star of dense, heavy pain in the off-green grass.

"And all this because of the most silly things. I may be 13, almost, but I know idiocy when I see it. And I see it in mother."

"The world is filled with idiots. You would condemn just one? One person?"

"She's my fucking mum! And aren't you missing the point?"

Elsa was tired of this. Tired of mystery and fear. Tired of it all being about him.

"People and their points. Points points points. Sometimes they score them, sometimes they make them, but to miss it is an atrocious thing. Apparently."

John looked at her, through the gleam of anger, but also puzzlement.

"You haven't explained this to me. You talk in riddles. I dislike riddles. Your anger isn't wrong but it is without explanation.

John, I'm not saying you shouldn't be angry. I actually sort of understand. You were correct. We are of like minds and like souls. But I don't know why I'm so...sure."

"What is _your_ point?"

Hiding the scorn from that word, she replied her challenge: "I don't have a point, exactly. No, we are going to sit here in the grass and talk, and I'm not leaving until I know you better than before I came here."

John looked at her, less enraged, but still pissed off mightily.

"Fine."

He took off his leather jacket and lay it carefully and spread out on the grass.

Elsa, having no alternative, sat on the grass.

But as he sat, he took pity on her and handed his jacket over. His hand shook less and he suddenly found himself exposed. Bit halfway through handing it over, he knew it was too late.

Elsa took the jacket and held it with a blank expression.

"To sit on." He mumbled.

Elsa did so.

"So, what do you think I think?"

Elsa didn't need much time for thought.

"I think you want to be understood. You're imperfect, but you think this is fixable. And you don't seem to get that I'm not here to be a model person. I'm here because I'm your friend. So when you get mad at me missing things and not making connections, that's because of your way, not mine."

"So you're a simpleton?"

"No. But you are certainly an idiot if you think that. Stop talking with your anger and start talking with the mind you champion so." She challenged.

John backed down for a moment.

Elsa remarked to herself internally of how short sighted he had been. They were going to be wet, cold and in the dark soon. The sun was refusing to fully appear. They were like droplets of water, saved by shade from the sunlight that would melt them away. By sheer chance, they sat were they sat and it would be sheer chance when they would leave, and where to.

Life would happen. Maybe not quickly, but eventually, a need to eat or drink would become clear and she wondered how long she could resist it.

It was the larger things, life-sized things, that _were_ coming, that bothered her at the darkest corner. But she sat down and talked anyway.

She decided it was better to seize the now and suffer for it tomorrow.

John had reached that conclusion far earlier, when he first peered at the slightly leaning fence post up his driveway.

But it took his jacket, his armour, all-black, with no features of note, that he treated with elevated compassion, being handed over, for her to sit in the moment, the now, all by herself. Powerful maybe. But she wasn't one to think that way. Symbols were pointless without meaning and John cared about that far more than she.

_God, what a confusing way to live. Are friendships always so strange?_

* * *

Anna was painting.

She did not do it as much as she wished. Cursed with being in one place for far too long, she had little inspiration to paint. Too few new muses. She was told she was gifted by most, even by the art-blind Elsa. But Anna was never satisfied. Works she had started two years ago still sat, unfinished. The white paper ones were the worst. They wouldn't last time very well, but here they were, heavy, crusted where paint had been placed and yet, smoother, more real, on the plain blank parts of the paper.

She was really losing her persistence with it.

Stunted with herself, she had not been able to grow with a balance of time, some for work, or school, some for art, some for sleep, and some for other little things. Faced with nothing to do, she found two dividers.

The first was that she would be as she normally was now. She would sit, think to weep and fail to, bemoan her current senselessness to time and to her life's progression and, facing all these things, be out of her artists mind.

On better days, she was only overwhelmed. She would have an idea, set it out, start it and then, little problems would arise. Anna knew that line wasn't quite perfect. Then, she would attempt to salvage it, and make it worse. It was more than just what she could see: She knew instinctively that viewers would likely never see the work, never be bothered by it. And yet, she could not ignore it, so she would grow timid about continuing and stop, annoyed at herself.

And on and on it would go. People who had asked her to paint something, usually from a TV show or film, sometimes books, would wonder what they were waiting for. They usually were nice to her face about it, but she knew they were annoyed. Art is a tedious business and, like always, it was at odds with how people went about their wants. Anna knew this well.

And the few works she did complete, usually acrylic ones, she charged nothing. She thought it impolite.

_Anna, what should we ask Oaken for in exchange for this?_

_Whatever he wants Mum. It's up to him._

She had painted today after useless half-sleepiness that seemed to last a day. She didn't bother to check. But it was daytime and through the light of the blinds, she could barely discern her room. She found its cavernous silence and unsure light on its farthest walls a decent motive to leave the bed. She usually painted, as it were, 'by commission' but she sometimes dabbed out something of her own. She never displayed them, considering the ones that weren't failures to be boring anyway.

Looking, as she rarely did, at past free work she had done on whims, she found nothing redeemable. Looking at them, they had seemed lifeless and basic and composed by someone who had tied their soul outside the door when they made it.

Leaving the bed, she felt tired and her hands loose still, but the paintbrushes were still very ready. She didn't know, or ask herself, why they were out.

Then, she found she had no water.

But a glass sitting on top of her vanity soon solved that. She failed to wonder who might have left it.

What she painted this time was something strange.

In its centre was a big, blue, smoothly rounded ball of light. It looked like a fusion between ice and electricity. It had its brightest point at its centre and she added little lines curved around it to further cement it in the viewers' eye. It was the largest object on the page. It seemed to be fighting to leave its own area into the sides of the page currently blank. Anna had painted this first, to establish a vanishing point. Adding several layers to it, she liked its symmetry, but couldn't stop yet.

Driven by the artists itch, she went on, crafting the left third of the canvas. This side, near the centre had a blue tinge, but began to get darker and greyer as it moved away towards the left. Anna made out of it a brick wall, with golden lines on its outer, visible points and a crack in it or two that had traces of luminescent rainbows. She soon created a brick wall, still being built, hiding behind it a great light of some sort. Not fazed by her own imagery, she pressed on. She had to.

The wall was not complete but above it laid a small rainbow. It was small and circular and she wondered why it had to be there. But it only covered the above of the brick wall. The lines were clearer here and quite structured. It had a weight to it too, like it was able to crush something were it toppled. Shadows were all around, but they did not obliterate the facade. They instead gave it a darker, uncertain detail.

She turned her mind away from making the brick wall cover the entire page and instead began the right side. Here, she made the brush much wetter and painted in very loose lines. Eventually, a hand appeared. It was held open, towards the blue light. The hand was almost black at its base but as it rappelled into the page proper, from the right side, it began to lighten and soon coloured lines clung to it, but the hand itself became whitened.

Eventually Anna had to paint the entire right-sided edge in a thin, grey rim. Out of it sprang flowers; actual life from that same sludgy pit. Blue remained absent from this display and when she looked back she realised the brick wall was also absent of it.

The blue was all of its own. Colour coming in from the dark on one side, escaping it. Colours of light trying to break through the wall on the other side. The left side was closed, restricted, ordered. The right side was open, with its colours confined to a thin, flowery strand, growing from darkness. The centre was a fusion of and rejection of both in different ways.

Anna saw restriction everywhere. She saw she had trapped three entities or things, denying them something the other had.

In some sense, she thought of her parents. Her father closed himself while being blunt outwardly, while her mother had a darker shade of view on everything, but pretended she didn't for the sake of others.

But she could not find herself in the centre. But she did find something to loath about the whole thing. She had painted 3 things, really, on the same canvas.

After the temporary pride she habitually took in completing a work, she soon grew agitated by it. It wasn't boring which was a problem. Because that meant it was interesting and thus that it had meaning. She looked for meaning in these times and yet, she hated finding it. They were always cold feelings, or feelings she wished she'd left buried.

She had dug up the corpses of her past over and over but the soil was cracking with the number of dig ups and the corpses became corrupted with the constant exhumations. Whatever this painting represented, she didn't like it. It was showing something she really, desperately wanted to unsee. But the details were not there yet.

Before she could destroy it and scrub it from the earth, she was interrupted by the strangest sentence she had heard for a while.

"Anna, its Elsa. She needs you."

Anna rose up quite quickly.

"Wait, what? What's going on?"

Her Father replied sternly and directly.

"Come on, I'm taking you to her friend's house. Things are happening and Elsa will need to see you."

He began to turn round, not wasting any precious time.

"Why?"

He stopped and did not look at her, but still spoke, intensely and with a boom that never quite went down.

"She's upset. She's with that friend. The one with the boring name."

"John?"

"Yep, I think so."

These conversations were very short and quick. Crocodiles probably had longer, open-mouthed conversation. At least Anna thought so.

She went back into her room, spun around and took it in, letting her dulled brain wake up.

_Clothes. I need clothes._

She dressed quickly, finding a dress amongst dirty and clean clothes. Her father was very punctual and had no patience for anyone being behind his pace. He called patience the most pointless virtue.

_Well, time wasted isn't time wasted when you're having fun?_

_But this isn't fun. What could possibly be fun about an upset Elsa and John being involved Anna._

_You phosphorous dullard Anna!_

Anna marched out of the room, marching at her father's command to leave. With each step her mood boiled anew with a different, conscious, steaming train of thought.

She was happy, driven, untired, sad, loathing.

But she realised later that at that moment, the only thing that had really changed, getting into the car on that dreary day, was that before, she was docile to her depression and fear.

Now, including John in the scrapped parchments of whatever was going, she was pissed off. Melancholically, colloquially, alarmingly pissed off.

_No one messes with my Elsa. _

**Authors Notes:**

**I am aware one or two words here are not technically real, but I follow Phillip Larkins example, particularly in his poem "Churchgoing". If the invented word is obvious in its meaning and serves to improve the immediate prose, then ill use it.**

**I cannot paint. I haven't got the brain for it. Probably why I write.**


	14. Chapter 14

"What about your father?"

"No, he isn't around exactly."

The night had arrived; greyish light matted the sky, as the two contrasting clothed figures sat in grass that was damp like a faintly used toilet seat. They had stuck their shovels in the soil and they had to till whatever was dredged from it.

A wind derived from the air, with no direction, keeping them from a comfortable temperature. Elsa was feeling sensitive every moment. Her body sensed a million pins just a millimetre from her skin. It made her want to scratch all over herself for no particular reason.

"Why not?"

John fiddled with a stick on the ground. "Long tail, little time to tell it."

"We have until sunrise" she said, realising as she said it that it was true. Neither had set a time or end point until now.

"Exactly. Look, there's something I've been meaning to bring up with you. Something I don't think you realise is there."

She looked at him blankly and with staring eyes. She awaited his words and tried to stay still. Doing what she could to ignore the wind, she was surprised how tired one became when they made effort to stay still.

"You see, there's this condition, this quirk of the brain that some people have. It went nameless for centuries but recently, in the last ten or fifteen years, it has a name and many faces."

"What do you mean 'it has a name and many faces'?"

"I mean that we know what it is and many people have it."

Elsa sensed what John was about to say, she wouldn't like. She was on the side of imbalance to surprises.

"It's a medical condition that you're born with. It's called the Autism Spectrum. Ever heard of it?"

Elsa furrowed her brow. It sounded familiar. Like how you would remember the name of a machine and know nothing about the machine, or a once notable person's name, now obscure, who you never learned or heard about. But you nonetheless knew their name.

"I have heard of it before. Mother and King used to talk about it a lot."

John exhaled in a smile. He peered downward and fidgeted more aggressively. This would take some time.

"It's a difference of mind. It has many signs."

He stopped his fidgeting and looked around aimlessly, thinking and speaking at once.

"The chief one is the following: Obsessive, repetitive behaviours, good and bad, which are called 'stims', short for stimulation."

Elsa wiggled her fingers and John pointed at them, wide eyed and grinning. "See? What you did there. That's one. When you are happy with yourself, you rub downwards on your stomach, like you are rubbing it, don't you?"

Elsa looked John's way with a recognition she never felt before. "Yes. Is that...a stim?" she asked. She suddenly seemed hopeful now, vigorated.

"Yes, Elsa, yes, it is." He smiled and she couldn't resist smiling back. "Cool, eh? All those different things. I sometimes tap my fingers. And I notice that when you stand for a while, you shift slightly more weight on one foot, then the other?"

"Yes, I do! I don't know why I do it; it just feels weird not doing it."

"Precisely."

John nodded in Elsa's direction and she returned it, after a moment's hesitation.

"What are the other parts of it?"

John came back to himself, finding him different.

"Well, we have special interests, things we hold dearly and learn everything there is to know. Mines were names, words and how they become words, their derivatives, origins. Did you know that when they came up with the idea of stress, they had a contrasting, positive stress called 'Eustress?'"

Elsa looked bland in features for a moment. John wasn't sure what to do and for a moment, felt like panicking.

"Well, I am obsessed with chess." She paused and looked down. She was deep in thought. John found it strangely exciting to watch her think. Her brain was remarkable to watch. You could tentatively feel the wires powering away, making connections.

"And I feel sad when I don't have one. I feel aimless and emptied without an interest. Is that an autism thing?"

John simply nodded. His mood was beginning to shift towards that of the teacher, the expositioneer. He decided she should ask if she wished.

After a long silence, when the wind temporarily worked to deafen them, it calmed again as the last spurt of day was wiped from the sky.

"Elsa, ask anything you like. I know this subject like the soles of my feet."

She was stoically still. Unnaturally motionless. He was sure she wasn't even breathing. Then her hands met each other and she slowly moved again.

"Is it why I seem so other? So different?"

John stood up, half stumbling, half sighing. He began to walk in circles and Elsa was distracted by his behaviour. He acted like a human robot, human in motion but robotic in awareness.

"We were born on the wrong planet, Elsa. The world is a big, loud place, with too many people in it. There are rules we will never learn and things we don't understand. And this isn't our fault. We didn't choose birth."

Elsa gave up following his motions and stuck to the words. "Why are we autistic?"

"I don't know. Nobody does yet."

"Do other people know about it?"

"Some of them, yes. They see it as a disorder and, for now, it may as well be." He announced.

"Why might it well be?"

John stopped his pacing and looked at her for a second, taking her in from his improved stature. "Because we are punished for our differences, Elsa. Our subtleties. It's not like racism, where the hatred is infectious; painting everything someone does and thinks like a bad case of TB. It's more background." He winced to think of it.

"They hate us, yes, but not universally. And more often than not, we aren't hated, but pitied, or just ignored. And half the time, what bothers us isn't even addressed and we suffer quietly. Ditto for people who don't us voices to talk."

Elsa wasn't sure how to take this.

"That's quite a rash thing to say. How can you prove we are treated like that?"

John stood and walked restlessly, half angry and half happy at the challenge. Elsa was moving her feet and shifting them about, without knowing it. The night-time was real and concentrated now.

"Because first of all..." he startled her with one finger raised to make a literal point "...if we were treated and understood better by them, you would know what you were. Second..." he lowered his voice to a soft tone "...can you honestly think of many times when other people made you happy and calm?"

_People. Stress._

_Stress because...expectation?_

_Misunderstanding. Yes._

_Assumptions on their part._

_Oh my god. He is right!_

Without any kind of warning Elsa's brain suddenly flooded with energy and she found herself stretched back to past times. In a moment, she thought of her most poignant memories, regardless of happiness. What she found was a strange after taste. A feeling of loneliness and confusion made unreal by how long it had been, and sweetened by the presence of just one person. Anna. But she was an anomaly of fortunate proportions and even she was prone to long periods of loneliness.

When Elsa had thought about her past, she found John kneeling down, trying to comfort her somehow. His fingers were still and his eyes did not blink.

"That feeling? Of loneliness and fear, of confusion and frustration at a frightening world?" He had soft eyes, she saw. This meant a lot to him. She found also, that it meant a lot to her too. The more she listened to him, the more real she became to herself. He was not a saviour or a blessing, he was a conduit to her, for this message that she should have heard long ago.

"Elsa, you are not alone."

He held her gaze and when she showed she understood, he nodded conformingly.

Tired from all he said, he sat backwards and looked up, resting against a rough stone wall. He realised after some time, he was not wearing his jacket.

Elsa was still unsure of all the things he said. She was assured nonetheless that what they had was shared. She hoped it was only partial. John was an uneasy character to get to know. Elsa was not to forget this. She found her figeting was harder to do because of her new attire.

"This will sound strange but I like the feeling of your jacket. I like how heavy it is."

"Oh, well thank you, I believe. You know, pressure on the body, the limbs, that's part of autism too. We feel different in our bodies from others."

Elsa was reeled back in without resistance. "Ah ok. In the same way that I have a weighted blanket?"

He looked at her and paid more attention. "A weighted blanket? I didn't know you had one."

"Yes, I do. My Mother got me it and it helped me sleep. She called it lucky."

"Your mother sounds like a hit-miss kind of woman."

She laughed and John realised he had not really heard that sound before. He was all smiles for it. He made her laugh!

"She certainly is. She has her ways and I have mine. We get along like black and white."

He looked at her coldly instantly and Elsa had to take a moment to think. What had she done wrong?

_Black and white on the board? I don't get it, is he upset about the colour? The way they..._

Elsa suddenly knew why.

_Ah. Right._

"Oh, I mean chess pieces. Black and white."

John laughed this time, but with unease.

"Let's not joke about race."

"Agreed. It is not right."

That exchange had, Elsa was keen to learn other things.

"John, thank you, for the autism stuff. I promise, at first chance, I'll look it up and learn about it because it just sounds like me. And the way you talk about the world, it's not unlike me, you know? I don't find it hard to see your point of view on that, but I do with most other people."

"Well, most people like a loud, annoying and populous world."

Elsa now wanted to discuss him. She had been waiting for sometime but got carried away with John's explanations. It was her turn to interrogate.

"Is that what home is like?"

He glared at her.

"Home is many things. It's not a house or a-"

"Oh stop it, would you? Stop with the philosophising. This is real." Her voice almost broke. "And right now, deflecting me isn't working. I need you to accept that. I thought we were going to talk about this."

He looked away and stared at an angle that plunged his eyes into the dark. So dramatic. She wanted to slap the silly sod. The mood had changed rather quickly.

_Life without filters as mum would so delicately put it._

The sounds of the night worked away, doing nothing. It was a night of nothing. Nothing changed. There was no great pantheon of things. Elsa couldn't believe how empty it was all seeming. But the daytime wasn't any better. And straddled with the dark figure in the corner of his corner of the garden, freezing though he might of been, she wasn't feeling much pity. She was annoyed at him for his sudden defensiveness.

_Boys, and their dramas. How did we get stuck with the overthinking trope exactly?_

But rethinking gender and friendship would help her in no way here. When the idiot finally spoke, he spoke with extreme reluctance.

"Fine, fine. To put it simply Mum is...troubled. And I've learned to just ignore it."

"And why do you ignore?" She asked probingly. "Is it easier?"

"Well, it by no means makes things difficult." He smiled a dead smile and might as well have wilted in fast forward as he spoke.

"Was it difficult before?"

John took a shallow breath, not quite relaxing him as he hoped. He spent a very long time considering his answer.

"In some ways. The problem is the way it changes. When I think about it, it's all quite hazy. Not because I don't know what happened but because my mind doesn't want to. It's protecting me, in its way."

He ended with that tell tale staring off as he finished abstractly. Like he had delivered some great address.

Before she continued, she yawned without ceremony and John noticed.

"What changes? What happens, John?"

He played with his hands, deliberately delaying his answers, not looking at her. He wasn't enjoying this bluff. But he had to, else he would face it quicker. She yawned again. And he noticed again.

"She drinks, obviously..."

She yawned after another 15 second pause.

"...but she ignores it too and everyone suffers."

She tried to look at him directly, entangle herself to his issue, and show him she cared. But she didn't really have a clue what she was doing. She wondered if John did.

"Elsa, nothing will come of this." He said dismissively.

"Well how do you know that? How can you know that?"

John was out of answers, out of questions. Out of energy. He had been awake too long.

"Because I'm clever." Her eyes could roll planets.

"Really? You just expect me to work with that, do you?"

"I expect you to believe me. You are my friend." He said confidently.

"No John. Friends are not deflective at the first sign of trouble. You wanted help, John. The minute you sat down you were deciding but then you handed me that Jacket. Your second skin. You hold onto it everywhere and you never let it get creased in the wrong places or get dirty and you hate it when others touch it. When you handed it over, you were trusting me. But not enough."

He looked at her, deadpan, refusing to give any ground.

"Not enough, eh?"

"No. You think it was all just a physical barrier but we both know it goes deeper. It's your brain, right?"

"I do have a brain Elsa."

"And when did you last use it?" She quipped.

"What do you mean?" he asked dumbly.

Elsa rubbed her hands softly against each other, taking the edge off her growing uncertainty. "If you are so clever, why don't you help yourself?"

She looked directly at him for the first time in a long time.

"You found I was lonely. SO why don't you find it in yourself?"

He was still not budging, even as his face contorted into discontent.

She went on. "Is it because you don't feel its close enough yet, between us?"

She tried and tried again to stare him into looking back, still nothing. A risk to take but...

"Do you need Isabelle?"

John turned to her, holding back body bags of feelings, rotting him away speedily. No, no more. This had to stop.

_Don't do it._

"Oh fuck off, Elsa."

She looked, for a split second, unfazed. But her delayed reactions caught up with her emotions. She pulled back and stopped looking at him, a genuine wish to realise what he just said. He convinced himself it was weakness on her part. He leaned forward, sneering at her.

"You act like I'm the bad one out the two of us and play it off as honesty? Well fuck you. I can't handle any of this, ok? I have too many things running in my head. I feel like Windows Vista! And amazingly, Elsa, being clever doesn't stop people fucking drinking. The self or someone else."

She almost laughed, but unable to do so, she renewed her ability to look away.

"And you are making it worse, so fuck off."

He ended his comments too flippantly.

"Just fuck off."

Had he said it with power, she may have been scared. Ended with uncertainty, she might sympathise. But he chose flippancy, and paid for it.

He hated everything about this moment. But not nearly as much as he hated the sheer white hatred she seared into his face in response. Her eyes were menacing spheres, hotter than the sun. He did not relent on the surface of his face but privately he felt too much on top of things. John was pissed off, but he felt guilty now. And it wasn't going to stop. Nothing could. She had been wrong, yes. But that didn't mean he could just bad mouth.

Elsa somehow knew that even at this hellish horizon, he hadn't thought a thing about her, only what she exhibited.

_What an animalistic mind._

She stood up and dropped his jacket without resplendence or decency. He sat awkwardly, not wishing to move or even slightly compromise his own perceptions. And he was all guilt. It was in his bones and in his blood. Guilt was keeping him there, he said. Guilt wasn't what he wanted, he said.

Elsa strolled away somewhere. Guilt was all he had. He lived to feel, but could not hope for hedonism. He was too lazy. Elsa lived for questions, a nobler thing

He found himself back with Isabelle on his mind.

Isabelle was too pungently correct when she said Elsa was a Socratic person. Not in that way was it said, but it was a strange compliment. Isabelle never gave direct compliments. Direct compliments were deceptive and indirect tones were genuine. But she had changed tack with Elsa. Why?

He had no clue.

Sure she had walked away from him, like many others, he held his wrist tightly, not wishing to show himself any tear in his mind material.

"You alright?". He half-begged, without warmth, over his shoulder.

She was still there. Walking in the grass. She didn't know where to go. Nor what time it was. She wanted to go home.

"Yeah". She answered.

There was a long pause while each of them spent a great deal of energy not looking at each other.

John never thought he would have to tell someone. Tell them why. But he had nothing to lose. A great deal to fear, rather. So he started emptying his extensive jacket pockets, taking great care and even love while handling it.

He removed each item and placed them down neatly on the grass. After 5 minutes of hearing nothing, he made a decision. A great change was coming. He would have to face it with bear teeth or he might not make it as he was. Autism did not do well with change. Until it could adapt to new things, there was the eternal challenge of relearning old habits or worse, learning new ones. He was special. And so was she.

Two minds of the same kind. The same tribe, perhaps. But now that time was ending. And he wouldn't end it on a downer.

After all, he thought, it would spoil their ending, if this was it.

His best kept secrets still went unknown to anyone but him. And before he could dare reveal them to Elsa, he would have to keep them away, or he would get aggressively defensively hostile. It was hopeless.

But he didn't want to stay locked away forever. Isabelle had taught him much and the one thing he chose never to forget was too always have your armour and wear it proudly. You didn't dare discard it, not unless you were sure you didn't need it.

He couldn't have been less sure. His mums drinking, his father's absence, his dangerously long times of solitude. It wasn't sustainable.

_I could tell her._

Ah, how much he could tell. That he was supposed to leave later that day, go with mum, somewhere new. She had spoiled it though. Found the bottle again. John didn't understand its lure. It smelled horrid. But whatever it was, his mum couldn't help it.

He loved her, he needed her but part of him really wished to hate her, to have some kind of certainty.

And here he was, pushing away Elsa and unloading that rage unto her. No more. Not fair.

He was about to stand up and go to her when he found, without any element of shock, she walked back into his vision again and sat. He quickly pondered how someone could be so pale. She really glowed in the dark, this girl. But not of fire. Whatever it was he was thinking, it was more soluble. It was changeable. It didn't stay the same for long.

Elsa really lived in a world of slow drowning. Her overloads from everything around her were part of who she was. She and he were at different stages of similar life cycles, at least to him. She had so much she was going to learn. Alas...

John looked at her and turned sombre suddenly. She noticed and did not trust it.

"If you are going to hurl more abuse at me, you have a fight on your hands."

Knowing she was serious, he turned on his social programming, trying to be delicate.

"I'm sorry, for that. I'm sorry for pushing you away."

Elsa crossed her hands. She didn't demand a better apology, but she didn't find it was enough either.

"Given the way it's all happened, I can understand John. But I can't accept it."

He nodded appreciatively. "I know. Can...Can you ever...?" He pleaded.

She sighed loudly from tiredness.

"I don't know John."

Each of them wanted to tend to themselves, but John had an idea. A what if. It was a big 'if'. But he needed to better himself and avoid further damage. It was time.

"I'm going away Elsa." He announced.

She nodded blankly. "Where and when?"

John replied. "Today or, well now tomorrow, I suppose. Or maybe today again. And to the city."

Elsa nodded again. "Ok. And what is the plan?"

He stood up abruptly and began pacing around like a man driven by a machine.

"The plan is I go to the city, stay there, go to high school there after the break and...Well, that sums it up quite well."

She looked at him, spitefully wishing she would go on.

He was serious.

"You mean it. I know you do. You don't lie when you start pacing."

He smiled slightly more lively. "Very true."

He looked to her for a reaction. As it always was with Elsa, he didn't find one. She had to speak first.

"Are you leaving out of choice?"

He demurred. "No. Not exactly. But I do have one thing."

"What is that one thing? Actually, why are you leaving?"

John stuttered with his answer. He had come to the worst of it.

"Well, I am meeting Isabelle there and I'll have another school, I'll be free-"

"Isabelle?"

She was disappointed suddenly. Before there was restraint in it but now it festered like an abscess on her face.

John didn't reply, he just looked down. After the silence became common, Elsa realised he didn't want to speak again. She could have let him solder himself away, but chose to risk his ire again. She would fight back.

"You accepted what I am going to guess was your Mothers planning to move out, because of the chance to meet her again?"

He nodded, emotionless failing.

"Well, i'll actually be seeing her at school. Same high school, see?" He whispered.

Elsa shook her head. "You're a fool."

John leaned back, almost lying on the grass.

"It's sad, because I know I am. Yet I am still happy to know it."

That settled it then. He was going back to a person who turned him inside out with pain. Whatever her draw was, it was singular in Johns life. But not like Anna in Elsa's. That was better.

No tears like those tears Elsa saw those months ago. Elsa and Anna shared their pain. John and Isabelle, it was more of an extraction process, with one person doing the extracting.

She pitied him even more. He was so lost and somehow still believed in his own intellects power to see through peoples manipulations. Elsa decided not to fight it. He wasn't convincible.

"So, is this it? You leave?"

"Yes, think so."

The two of them stood up and knew that they each wouldn't be sitting down again. For the first time, Elsa noticed a faint blue streak of sky, very far from them, almost indistinguishable from the dark night. But it was there, resting. It would only get brighter and consume the land. It struck her, suddenly, that something so meaningless and so isolated, something that was changing all the time and something that would never be in this exact shape and form again ever, was so beautiful. And she looked at John, that idiotic fellow she had known for so short a time, and she believed it was the same for him.

Maybe it wasn't beauty but it was certainly a sense of the fleeting. She realised, for the first time, that she didn't even have a picture of him. He would leave and go away and not exist in her minds perceptions anymore. It was so frightening it was cool. It made her shake with excitement, even. She was_ stimming_, mentally. _Ah there's now a word for it! And all this despite what hes done. Maybe I'm the fool._

John seemed to bow slightly as the slightest light hit his back. She could see his face. He was softly smiling.

"I am going now, back in the house. You can stay, if you like."

Elsa wanted that. Not just this house, any house. She needed warmth and rest. She was so cold. It hadn't been felt until now.

"If that's ok John." She still didn't smile, but she did smooth out her features. She didn't stare him down, mainly because it hurt to do it. Eyes were blades, once again.

"It's fine. I'll take the couch. Normally I wouldn't but honestly I feel like I'm about to fall over."

They began walking, John slightly leading. A quick view of the clock in the kitchen through the window told him it was 3 am. This time of year, it would be light soon. He was glad to see it wasn't much longer.

"If you do, I won't help you up". She quipped.

He laughed as loud as he could, but it came out as a wheeze. The air was cold as ever and it felt heavy on both of them. John suddenly realised why, and what he had done earlier.

_The jacket._

He turned around just as they reached the door. He held the jacket like he was about to put it on someone.

"Elsa, I want you to have this."

She stopped, took a step back and took it in.

"Why the leather jacket?"

John looked at it and back at her, trying to decipher what she meant.

"I mean, you love that thing. You never go without it. Why give it to me?"

He really never left it. It was always being worn, bulging with endless pockets, the black cowskin thick and slightly too big for him. It was clean looking and yet old as well. It looked slightly grey, it was aged. Like she would one day. On the inside, it was blue material. You wouldnt see it from the outside, making it seemed pointless to her. But it was so personal to him in her mind, even at this zenith of their relationship rife with his problems, it seemed wrong to take it.

"You see the blue?" He pointed down to it. She nodded.

"The blue never meant much to me. It's just a colour. But for you, it will be more meaningful. You wear blue clothes, blue school bag, stare at the sea and don't mind the cold at all. It barely scratches your surface."

She was getting drawn in, amazingly. "So, you think of me when you see that?"

John furrowed his brow and then unfurrowed just as quickly.

"I wear this as a defence against a loud, Neurotypical world. It keeps me from having to suffer for the fact I live in a world made without me in mind. It's my armour. But you need it more than me. Maybe it's not armour. I personally think it would, on you, exude power."

"Power?"

"Yes, power. Power of mind and of will. You are fantastically strong, Elsa. Resilient. But you are still young like me. We don't know anything yet. We have time to learn but in the meantime we need something that will last for us. A permanent thing in an ever-changing world.

This jacket will last. And it can be whatever you want it to be. Wear it. Hang it up. Use it as a quilt. Just don't sell it, because for that I could not forgive you."

He did not see it, but she rolled her eyes again.

"But do what you want otherwise. It's my gift, for being my friend. But more than that, I hope it shows that I trust you. You are autistic, like me. I know this will mean to you what it would not to anyone else."

Elsa took in everything he said as fast as she could. Interesting though it was, she was tired and it showed. Yawning and resting her eyes for a moment, she finally smiled.

"Do I have to wear it and give it a deep meaning?" She asked

"No, you could just keep cus its cool, like us."

He was being coy with her. "Cool, are we?"

John turned sarcastic, fingers pressed down and all.

"Of course, no one's cooler than us." He suppressed a laugh and watched Elsa do the same. He was still holding the jacket.

"Ok John. We are 'cool' and cool people wear leather."

John folded it up and gave it to her as she outstretched her arms. It was held like a baby.

"Got it in one." He pointed at her swiftly, like marking a full stop.

He opened the door and in they went. As the heat hugged them, they instantly felt sleepy and sought the nearest rest. They ended up in the living room. Elsa was handed a blanket and tried to ignore the smell. The room was mess. He expected her to get up but she didn't, staying with him.

"John, I...I have a strange request."

He turned on the TV, switching it to mute.

"Shoot."

"Do you have a weighted blanket?"

He answered in the negative.

"Well, is there any way I could feel weighed down? I hate feeling my torso rise when I breathe lying down. Is that a stim too?"

John turned from the TV to her, he was almost sleeping.

"Yeah, will be. What can I do?"

The couches were very flat and Elsa found no trouble getting comfortable. She knew where his room is but she was already wanting sleep. She saw no need to get up now.

"Could you put your legs over my torso, maybe?"

He turned back to her again and judged the dimensions of the couch.

"If you shift a bit, sure."

Elsa smiled.

Normally, she slept with a blanket that was made to feel heavier than normal. She figured it was maybe autism.

_Such an exciting concept!_

If she didn't, the top of her body felt very sensitive and uncomfortable. Like it was being assaulted by the very sense of weightlessness.

Weight meant comfort. John's legs sufficed.

After some shifting, they agreed he would wait till she slept then go to bed. But soon he was sleeping. And so they slept in that position, comfortable, rested, and long passed caring about time and place.

For now, the world did not need to exist. They were sleeping. And so it did not bother them.

That night, for the first time, Elsa recognised the freedom this really was. She slept more comfortably than she ever had. All the motions and audio from the world stopped for a while. And her Autistic brain knew rest.

**Authors commentary:**

**From here, I can reveal that the story is changing. I mean proper change. We are going to see new things now that John has decided what he must do and Elsa still has much to learn about herself and the others. **

**I said this story was far from finished not long ago. That would still be an apt descripter for it. I have much to tell. It will end, like most things do, but how far away that is, im not one to say.**

**So if you hunger for more, take heart. There is much more. Big things are ahead. For now, i will put it so: This is the end of Part One.**

**Authors notes:**

**These chapters are becoming monthly. I have come to terms with this. I will update, as before, when I can. But I must plead for flexibility with time.**

**I am a serial procrastinator.**


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